Ports of Auckland’s long-running project to automate container handling has been delayed again with the likely start date now in August, or even later.
The council-owned company was tipping a July start, just two months ago, but the chief executive Tony Gibson has told councillors it will now tentatively be at least a month later.
Facing questions from Mayor Phil Goff at an audit and risk committee meeting, Gibson twice replied that it was not putting out a date, before saying “we think we are probably looking somewhere around August”.
The plan to replace 50 stevedores with a fleet of 27 unmanned straddle carriers was unveiled in 2016 and then expected to be running in 2019.
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The project has faced a series of delays, more recently due to the disruption of Covid-19, and the difficulty of transitioning from manual to automation during congested shipping movements, due to a global freight upheaval.
One of the latest delays is the need to do a full health and safety review of automation, following a council-commissioned review into three port deaths in three years, which called for improvements by the company.
Todd Niall/Stuff
A container ship being loaded at Ports of Auckland’s terminal which is in the process of being automated. (file photo)
The port company said three other criteria had to be met before the terminal went fully automated, instead of the current mix of part-automation and part-manual operation.
“Until such time as we meet those, we are not afraid to [further] delay if it means a delay,” Gibson told councillors.
On Tuesday, the port outlined the path to full automation without publicly indicating a date, and said freight companies and others would be given eight weeks notice once the date was set.
”On the go-live date we will close the container terminal for 84 hours [three and a half days] to prepare the manual part of the terminal for automated operations,” said the port in a statement.
It said 100 ships had been handled using the atuomated straddles, as the system was rolled out.
Ports of Auckland has been in the spotlight, with the council-ordered independent review into its safety culture, and demands from unionists for Gibson to resign.
“Our container terminal will become the first in New Zealand to use automated straddle carriers to load and unload trucks and operate the container yard,” said the port.
When the plan was unveiled in 2016, it envisaged around 50 fewer stevedores being needed, once the unmanned container straddles were fully in operation.
Ports of Auckland said automation was part of the work needed to ensure productivity and processing could continue to improve with the confines of it’s existing space on the city’s downtown waterfront.
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