Old quay rebuilt for Lantmännen's exports

At Port of Södertälje’s outer harbour is an old dolphin quay that was built in the 1950s. The quay has been in bad shape for quite a while and also poses a workplace hazard. It has therefore been closed and will now be adapted for grain exports.

A dolphin quay is a mooring equipment device consisting of several poles that secures the construction to the bottom. In the 50s ships were much smaller, and constructed in a different way than today. The old dolphin quay was made up of wooden poles that swayed when ships pushed into them as ships docked.

The new quay will be made up of six dolphins with four 25 meter pipes each and capable of receiving a vessel of up to 130 meters in length. Between 10 and 30 ships dock at the dolphin quay every year. The new construction will no longer sway but will be completely stable, as a normal quay. The whole project will cost 6.5 million kroner and the quay expected to last a good fifty years.

- The specialist underwater construction company SUAB has been given the reconstruction contract, says Tommy Engström, traffic manager at Port of Södertälje. They are doing a great job and we are very pleased with the work they have done so far.

The new quay opens on the 1st of June when it will be used for unloading grain from Lantmännens silos. Food supplier Lantmännen exports roughly 50 000 tons of grain per year, more or less depending on the year’s harvest. Some of the grain is exported abroad but some stays in Sweden and goes to Lantmännens own ethanol plant in Norrköping, for example.