Transpetro starts bidding process to buy 80 barges for ethanol.
Valor Econômico
Transpetro, the logistics arm of Petrobras, launches today one of the largest orders ever seen in the country for the carriage of cargo through waterways. The company will start a bidding competition to contract the construction of 20 barge trains - 20 pusher tugs and 80 barges - intended for the transportation of ethanol through the Tietê-Paraná waterway. Market estimates indicate the total value of the vessels may remain at nearly US$ 400 million. The company does not talk about values.
Altogether, 25 national and foreign companies will be invited, as of today, to take part in the business, with 70% national content. Among the interested parties are companies from the USA and the Netherlands, besides Brazilian companies. Bids will be received until July, so we may then open direct negotiations. "We expect to have the contracts signed until September or October", said Sergio Machado, President of Transpetro. The public bid will be open today at the Feicana/Feibio in Araçatuba (SP).
The entire order should be closed with one single shipyard in order to ensure scale. In the sector, there are those who bet it will be necessary to invest in the construction of a new shipyard or in the increase of the currently existing ones. "In my opinion, the vessels will have to be made along the Tietê since building the blocks elsewhere and then transporting them to the waterway will represent loss of competitiveness", said Fabio Vasconcellos, commercial officer of the shipyard Estaleiro Rio Maguari, from Belém (PA). Vasconcellos said the experience of foreign shipyards is welcome, but he believes the country has companies capable of meeting the order. He mentioned the case of Rio Maguari that built 20 barge-trains for the transport of fuel in the last four years.
According to Machado, the order may mark the beginning of a change in the Brazilian transport matrix with the increase of the use of the waterways. It will be the first time Transpetro will work with river barges, although the company already operates tankers on the Amazon river.
The order of Transpetro is being called Promef Hidrovia, version of the Program for the Modernization and Expansion of the Transport Fleet (Promef) that the company launched to build ships aimed at the maritime transportation of oil and byproducts. Machado said that the flow capacity of the Promef Hidrovia will be of nearly 4 billion liters of ethanol/year, nearly 20% of the market. Each barge train will have capacity to carry 7.2 million liters. This transport system is part of a corridor for the flow of the Petrobras ethanol, which seeks to cater to the domestic market and increase the competitiveness abroad.
Three terminals for the collection of ethanol will be installed along the waterway in places yet to be defined. The product will be carried through the waterway - on average segments of 500 kilometers - up to a pickup point located at 80 km from the Refinery of Planalto (Replan), in Paulínia. From there the product will follow through pipelines to the refinery and terminals of São Sebastião (SP) and Ilha D'Água (RJ). The ethanol corridor also includes an alcohol pipeline between Senador Canedo (GO) and the Replan.