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Infrastructure: Constanta Port, a pilot projects to link Europe to Asia, with a ferry-boat line from Georgia to Romania
Romania's Constanta Port can draw in tens of millions of euros from the European Commission for the implementation, starting in 2017, of pilot projects to link Europe to Asia, with a ferry-boat line from Georgia to Romania, Brian Simpson, coordinator of the Motorways of the Sea programme, an integrant part of the TEN-T Connecting Europe port transport infrastructure programme.
He told a news conference at the main offices of the Romanian National Maritime Port Authority Corporation (CNAPM) that he came to Constanta to identify actual possibilities of getting the Constanta Port and the Black Sea integrated with the European port transport infrastructure programme.
He said that after talks with the CNAPM executives and General Manager of the CFR Marfa SA national railway freight carrier Mihut Constantin Craciun facilities of immediate interest for investment of European funds with integration potentials for the making of motorways of the seas between Romania and Georgia were identified.
Simpson added that Constanta Port officials suggested funding a project for a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in the river and sea areas of the port, and, in close cooperation with CFR Marfa, they advanced the idea of rehabilitating and retooling two ferry-boats - the Eforie and the Mangalia - which they own, and refitting them with new engines running on LNG under a pilot project. Also CFR Marfa advanced the idea of fitting new engines, running on LNG, to diesel locomotives to reduce operation costs and pollution. The three projects, according to Simpson, may be the beginning of a motorway of the sea that would efficiently and ecologically develop multimodal transport in the Black Sea, between Europe and Asia, through Georgian ports and the Constanta Port, all the way to northern Europe.
CNAPM Constanta Director General Dan Tivilichi said the European official displayed interest and voiced full support for projects that regularise the flow of the River Danube to secure optimal depths for navigation all year long.