The post you are reporting:
Some very interesting observations from Neil which may come as a bit of a surprise to the Dover Chamber of Commerce who, from post #197, are under the impression that "DPPTL has set itself the target of ensuring that more of the passengers passing through Dover should become customers of East Kent companies and aims to reverse the decline in traffic which, with the exception of road haulage vehicles, has fallen steadily since 1997 as the following data shows."
Far from looking to increase passenger traffic, all the plans that Neil has outlined above are quite rightly focused on the cargo, unaccompanied freight, and energy sectors.
I suspect that any significant expansion of the passenger traffic would be a lost cause given the competition from Eurostar, Eurotunnel passenger shuttles, and the low cost airlines. In fact, things look far from rosy on the ferry front in every respect.
Eurotunnel holds all the cards. Fossil fuel costs for the ferries are set to rise dramatically but the tunnel is completely supplied from the French nuclear power grid. Furthermore, the tunnel cost £10bn to construct but they managed to persuade the reluctant private investors to sacrifice £7bn and are making a modest profit with the remnant £3bn debt.
In the context of this leviathan, the Dover ferry operation is very small beer and Eurotunnel recently started buying up the competition by purchasing the remnants of SeaFrance for what amounts to small change for them. As far as level playing fields go, this one is clinging to the North Face of the Eiger. Hard as it is to imagine, the future of Dover as preeminently a ferry port may be numbered.
Had to look up Blue Energy which transpires to be defined as: "Blue energy is the renewable clean energy that can be gained by mixing of two streams with different salt concentrations (e.g. sea water and river water), without carbon dioxide or any other pollutant emissions." On this basis, perhaps we can look forward to the Wellington Dock one day becoming a giant battery supplying all our needs, although it does sound like something Alex might have dreamed up!
With regard to the mention of efficient Vessel Traffic Management, I had the pleasure of visiting Port Control and Terminal Control last sunday and can vouch for the fact that they are running an impressively efficient operation. Let us hope that BG and his henchmen are not planning to outsource this along with everything else!
