Hosted this year by the Port of Barcelona, the 2nd GreenPort Cruise conference played host to over 120 delegates, from cruise ship operators, cruise terminal operators, port authorities, industry associations and suppliers to the cruise sectors, all looking to glean the latest information on the environmental and sustainability aspects facing cruise terminals across the world.

The one day conference focuses on four areas including onshore power supply, waste management, improving cruise ship terminals and port city interface panel discussion. This was then followed by the ever popular evening Welcome Reception, which was held in the World Trade Centre Complex.

Here’s some highlights of the day:

Onshore Power Supply
The hugely contested hot topic around onshore power supply versus the use of LNG at cruise terminals, was the first session of the day and quite rightly created quite a debate.

Alexandros Chiotopoulos, consultant at DNV GL Maritime Advisory, spoke about the possibility of retrofitting cruise ships to use LNG by lengthening them. In other words, by inserting an LNG ready-made mid-body section to cruisers. “It’s definitely an option worth investigating, but it’s case by case dependent and depends on your investment strategy,” he said.

Waste Management
Moderator Thanos Pallis, Secretary General from MedCruise opened up the discussion around waste management in ports, especially around waste reception facilities and waste, cruise residues collection and treatment and the overall management of waste within cruise port.

Improving Cruise Ship Terminals
Moderated by David Pino, President of Working Group, Guidelines for Cruise Terminals of PIANC. This session heard from three case studies – cruise facilities at Harlington Port, Barcelona Cruise Terminals and designing a cruise terminal at Miami.

Port-city interface panel discussion
Another hot topic at the GreenPort Conference was the port city interface panel discussion during the afternoon. How are ports and cities working together to better copy with the ever increasing number of passengers visiting cities via cruise ships? Greta Marini, Strategic Advisor, port city community affairs, AIVP was part of the discussion around how best to avoid port congestion. Greta believes that building a strong relationship between the port and the city are crucial to the future success of ports – especially in light of larger ships being built, which have a greater impact on the port environment, including congestion and seasonality.

Dr Marini added: “A smart port city is an ecosystem with a shared vision and strategy.”

Definitely a conference not to be missed. If you were not able to attend but would like to find out more on this, or any of our other events, please call our events team on +44 (0) 1329 825335 or email congress@greenport.com