Yakutia authorities eye new river port project to handle 20 million tonnes a year

Authorities of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia, a federal subject of Russia)  are considering the project of a river port of capacity of 20 million tonnes of cargo per year. The port could be built on the right bank of the Lena River, near the “Right Lena” station, the regional governor's press office said.

Presentation of a concept of industrial / logistics cluster "Yakut Industrial Park" (and a river port as its part) was held recently at a meeting chaired by Yakutia Gov. Yegor Borisov on the development of a transport hub in Nizhny Bestyakh.

The project was developed by Volga State Academy of Water Transport in conjunction with Lena United River Shipping Co..

Sergei Zheleznov, an associate professor, Transport Management Dept. of Volga Volga State Academy of Water Transport, who presented the concept, said that raw material resources in the central Yakutia make it important to create on the right bank of the Lena facilities for production of coal, fuel briquettes, different materials (ash bricks, cinder blocks, mixtures, sandwich panels, concrete slabs), of metal products based on the processing of scrap, lumber, non-ferrous metals, etc.

Concept is proposed to be transform into the project and implemented on the basis of public-private partnership with the involvement of "Vnesheconombank" funds. Developers say the project's payback period can be between 10 and 13 years, depending on economic conditions.