The new Seville harbour lock, whose construction was spearheaded by FCC, has opened its gates to ships. The first to sail through the new port infrastructure was the Turkish ship Tolga Genç, at 14:00 hours yesterday -Tuesday-. The Tolga Genç is a cargo ship 90 metres long and 13 metres wide, and it weighs 3,327 tons.

This is a fresh milestone in the fast-approaching end to the project. It marks the start of a short stage in which ships will use both the new lock and the old lock, until the levee can be built. Afterward the navigable channel will be opened and the old lock, on Alfonso XIII Channel, will be shut down, routing water solely through the new lock and closing off that branch of the Guadalquivir River.

A few days ago the lock gates and the new drawbridges over the lock were tested and found to operate smoothly. There are four gates and three drawbridges, two for vehicular traffic and one for trains. They are all lifted by large hydraulic jacks housed in the hollow abutment.

The new lock is 20 metres tall, 450 metres long and 40 metres deep. It will replace the old lock, which was more than 60 years old, and will make it possible to enlarge and improve the navigable channel.

The lock was called for by the Seville Harbour Development Plan, and it required an investment of close to 200 million euro. It will enable short-distance transport by sea to be increased considerably, perhaps to 12 million tons in the next few years, from the 5 million tons of today. This would mean a savings of 14 million euro in fuel each year, a reduction of 350 tons of NOx and 250 tons of CO2 emissions, the creation of 15,000 new jobs in the next decade and guaranteed flood protection for Seville.

FCC Construcción's port and harbour construction experience

FCC Construcción has a great deal of experience building complex projects in ports and harbours. For example, it built the floating dock in Monaco's La Condamine Harbour, the expansion of El Musel Harbour in Gijón, the Sant Adrià del Besòs Marina, the Olympic Harbour in Barcelona, Igoumenitsa Harbour in Greece and the solid bulk terminal at the port of Castellón.

It is currently involved in the improvement of the southern basin of Castellón Harbour, the first phase of the Baleares Quay and the multi-purpose terminal at Tarragona Harbour. Abroad FCC is building the new lock at the port of Vienna through its Austrian subsidiary, Alpine.