Jan de Nul Aids in West Africa's New Deepwater Port Project

Belgian construction firm Jan de Nul has announced its role in developing a new port situated 50 kilometers from Dakar, Senegal. The project is slated for completion in approximately 2.5 years.

Primarily built by DP World, the new deepwater port will see Jan de Nul in charge of creating a 5-kilometer access channel through dredging, which involves removing about ten million cubic meters of soil. Given the challenging ocean conditions and the area’s hard rock terrain, the company plans to deploy its most powerful dredging vessel, the Willem van Rubroeck.

In addition to the dredging efforts, the extracted material will be repurposed to reclaim roughly 89 hectares of land from the sea. This reclaimed area is intended to accommodate a terminal and a container storage facility.

The port is designed to divert some of the traffic from Dakar’s existing facility, which has reportedly reached full capacity. Once finished, the new deepwater port is expected to become the largest in West Africa, with the capability to simultaneously berth two of the world’s largest container ships.