The Port Authority of Taranto manages and operates the Port of Taranto. With an excellent natural harbor and a big sheltered bay (Mare Grande), the Port of Taranto is equipped with modern facilities to serve the shipping industry. The port covers over 340 hectares and almost 200 hectares are devoted to concessions.

The Port Authority of Taranto seeks to promote the Port of Taranto’s growth through the construction of a world-class container terminal and improvement of logistic support and facilities throughout the port. The Port of Taranto also plans to develop a 750-thousand square meter Distripark.

The Port of Taranto’s quays are a total of 10 thousand meters long including 8.7 thousand meters on concession and 1.3 thousand meters for public use. The port is open all year and is little affected by tidal changes. At 167 meters long with alongside depth of 12.5 meters, Quay 4-Head specializes in handling bitumen and can accommodate vessels to six thousand DWT. Quay 4 is 300 meters long with alongside depth of 12.5 meters and can accommodate vessels to 12 thousand DWT carrying cement. The Multi-purpose Quay and Quay 5 are two thousand meters long with alongside depths from 14 to 15 meters. These quays include operating areas of one million square meters.

Crude oil discharging takes place at buoy moorings with draught of 22 meters, accommodating vessels to 300 thousand DWT. Quay 3, at 230 meters long with alongside depth of 10.5 meters, handles vessels to 12 thousand DWT carrying ferro-alloys and slag. Quay 3 includes four thousand square meters of operating area. At 143 meters long with alongside depths from 10.5 to 16 meters, Quay 2-Head can accommodate vessels carrying fuel and tar up to 40 thousand DWT. Quay 3-Head also handles fuel and tar at a quay of 200 meters with alongside depth of 11 meters that can accommodate vessels to 30 thousand DWT. Quay 3-Head also has operating area of 13.4 thousand square meters.

Iron and steel products are handled at several quays with total length of three thousand meters and alongside depths from 10 to 11.5 meters. Quay 2-West is 550 meters long with alongside depth of 10 meters accommodating vessels to 40 thousand DWT and has operating area of 10.6 thousand square meters. Quay 3 has combined length of 1245 meters at two berths with 11 meters draught that can accommodate vessels to 45 thousand DWT. Quay 3-East has an operating area of 10.8 thousand square meters, and Quay 3 West has an operating area of 12.2 thousand square meters. Finally, Quay 5-West is 1200 meters long with alongside depth of 11.5 meters. Accommodating vessels to 45 thousand DWT, Quay 5-West has operating areas of 361.3 thousand square meters.

Quay 2-East is 515 meters long with alongside depth of 16 meters and, with operating area of nine thousand square meters, can accommodate vessels to 100 thousand DWT discharging iron ores. The Oil Jetty, handling refined oil products, is 1120 meters long with alongside depth of 11 meters, and it can accommodate vessels to 20 thousand DWT. Handling iron and coal, Quay 4-Head is 434 meters long with alongside depth of 23 meters and can accommodate vessels to 300 thousand DWT.

Several quays serve general cargoes. These include the Sant’Eligio Pier at 172 meters long. Pier 1-East is 320 meters long with alongside depth of 9.5 meters. With operating area of 1.6 thousand square meters, Pier1-East can accommodate vessels to 25 thousand DWT. Pier1-Head is 130 meters long with alongside depth of 8 meters and can accommodate vessels to 20 thousand DWT. Pier1-West, with operating areas of 13 thousand square meters, is 330 meters long with alongside depth of 12.5 meters that can accommodate vessels to 25 thousand DWT. Quay 2 is 290 meters long with alongside depth of 12.5 meters and, with 30 thousand square meters of operating area, can accommodate vessels to 22 thousand DWT. Finally, Quay 1 specializes in roll-on/roll-off cargoes. At 240 meters long with alongside depth of 8.5 meters and 1.8 thousand square meters of operating area, Quay 1 can accommodate vessels to 20 thousand DWT.

The commercial berths at the Port of Taranto include Quay 1, Pier 1-East, Pier 1-seaward, Pier 1-West, and Quay 2. Cargoes handled at these quays include cement, aluminum, clinker, iron ore, metal frames, wind turbines and blades, fertilizers, machinery, general cargo, and frozen fish.

The Port of Taranto’s Container Terminal is a state-of-the-art terminal with capacity to handle more than two million TEUs per year. Opened in 2001 at the Multi-purpose Pier, the Container Terminal grew from 150 thousand TEUs in 2002 to around 900 thousand TEUs in 2006. A dredging effort is underway to increase the alongside depth of the quay. The Container Terminal at the Port of Taranto has trading partners throughout the Black and Mediterranean Sea areas as well as Europe, the Americas, and the Far, Middle, and Near East. About 10% of the cargo traffic through the Container Terminal is foreign trade, while 90% is transshipments. The terminal is well-connected to Italy and Europe through five terminal sidings linked with the national railway network. Daily train service connects the Port of Taranto with terminals in Bologna, Acona, Naples, and Pomezia. In 2007, over a thousand container trains visited the Container Terminal at the Port of Taranto.

The Port of Taranto has a terminal dedicated to the Port of Taranto’s steel industry. With a total of more than 30 million tons of throughput per year, the terminal handles about 10 million tons of finished products each year. The steelworks were founded in the 1960s and privatized in 1994. The plant is a world leader in steel-making, and the industry is the Port of Taranto’s most important customer. Operated by ILVA, the concession uses a total of 4.6 thousand meters of wharf with alongside depths to 25 meters and operating areas of 931 thousand square meters. The terminal facilities unload raw materials (coal and iron ore) and load finished and semi-finished products (coils, pipes, billets, slabs, and sheets).

At the Oil Jetty, the Port of Taranto’s Oil Terminal handles crude oil, refined oil products, and by-products. Averaging between 5 and 5.5 million tons of cargo per year, a conveyor system links the jetty with the refinery. An underwater pipeline moves crude oil from tanker to refinery. An extension of the jetty is planned to meet needs for greater volumes of crude oil and finished products.

The Cement Terminal at the Port of Taranto, located at Quay 4, handles about 450 thousand tons of cargo per year. Linked by a mobile bridge with the nearby cement works, the berth’s conveyor system can handle 2400 bags or 400 tons of clinker per hour.

The Port of Taranto has plans underway to expand and improve port facilities and to open new areas of the port to the City of Taranto for municipal use. The Port of Taranto plan contains several key actions: extend Pier 5 by adding a new container terminal, encourage more roll-on/roll-off and ro-pax traffic, extend rail connects to all port quays and areas, and develop a multi-use center. Depending on growth in container traffic, the Port of Taranto intends the new container terminal to be a common-user facility. To be completed in 2010, the new container terminal will be well-integrated with existing facilities.

Review and History    Port Commerce    Cruising and Travel    Satellite Map    Contact Information