Image used for representation.
Hamad Port is not only the largest and most innovative port of the region which is fast becoming a hub of maritime trade in the Middle East but also an environmentally-friendly facility.
People generally know that Hamad Port is the largest port in the region employing smart technologies, innovations for its growing vessel traffic but its environmentally-friendly endeavours, practices are lesser-known in public domain.
Mwani Qatar, in a recent tweet, shared some interesting and laudable facts linked with the sustainable construction of Qatar’s gateway to the world.
“Hamad Port is considered the region’s largest and most environmentally-friendly project and this title has been well deserved for several factors, the most important of which is its success in relocating and moving more than 12,500 pieces of hard coral reefs.”
Sharing some other details of steps taken to preserve the environment while developing Hamad Port, Mwani Qatar tweeted about relocation of 14,300 square metres of seaweeds and 31,700 marine seedlings and avicennia trees providing shelter and nourish countless sea creatures.
In June this year on being recognised as one of the Greenest Ports in the world, Mwani Qatar had tweeted: “Environmental protection has been a key objective in all phases of Hamad Port’s construction.
The port’s international recognition as one of the world greenest ports proves that this goal has been achieved, underscoring its commitment to local and global environmental standards and adopting the latest innovative practices based on environmental sustainability and clean energy.”
Earlier in November 2016, Hamad port had won “largest smart and environment-friendly project” award that is granted to the best practices in safety, maritime environment and port operations.
All these environmentally-friendly measures taken by Mwani Qatar for development and running of Hamad Port have been widely hailed by different world organisations. The ‘World Port Sustainability Program’ on its website Sustainableworldports.org published an article “Hamad Port – Ensuring sustainable mega port development” in 2017 which states: “The guiding principle for the port management was to ensure that the project is sustainable and environmentally does not adversely affect the communities in the vicinity.
With guidance from the Qatar’s Environment Ministry, a separate project was set for independently monitoring the development activities with respect to their effects on environment. In particular the impact of the construction activities on air quality, coastal morphology, groundwater quality, marine ecology, sediment, noise, fauna and flora were closely monitored and follow up actions were taken where needed.”
The articles also details steps taken under a separate project for the relocation of ‘at risk’ marine life to alternate ‘recipient’ sites. “At the end of the monitoring period in 2017, the results were evaluated verifying that there was only minor environmental impact. The relocation (of marine life) project itself was considered very successful with 78% of the relocated communities surviving and now thriving,” the article adds.
