News / MSC proposes €1bn investment in Valencia's planned fourth box terminal

MSC’s terminal operating arm Terminal Investments Ltd (TIL) is set to plough more than €1bn into a new box facility at its west Mediterranean hub of Valencia.

Late last week the port authority of Valencia made public MSC’s bid to operate the port’s fourth container terminal – the sole bid that the port received for the project.

It said MSC had pledged to invest a total of €1.01bn in the project, which will be constructed in three phases, with the first taking 28 months to build 1.1km of quay side and 860,000sq metres of terminal area.

A second phase is planned to complete nine months later, and would see 400 metres of quay and 220,000sq metres of yard area added; and a third phase is planned for just under a year after that, and would see another 470 metres of quay and 280,000sq metres of terminal area added.

According to some estimates, the facility could add 5m teu of total annual handling capacity added to Valencia, effectively doubling the overall capacity of the port and making it one of the largest ports in the Mediterranean.

Currently the terminal is expected to handle its first box in 2024.

MSC has long been the port’s largest box client and was behind its ascent to become the largest port in Spain, overtaking the transhipment hub of Algeciras a number of years ago. Last year it saw box traffic grow above the market, with a 7.3% increase in volumes to finish the year with 5.18m teu handled.

However, the port is now nearing full capacity, which is estimated to be at some 5.5m teu.

Currently MSC’s traffic is handled at a dedicated terminal in the southern part of Valencia, adjacent to the former Noatum operation that was recently acquired by Cosco.

The third terminal in the port is run by Maersk subsidiary APM Terminals, following its acquisition of Spanish operator TCB, which means the 2M partners are likely to have a dominant position in Valencia.