Intermodal Transport Report
June 2014
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Table of Contents
- Executive Summary ................................................................................. 2
- Background and Objectives ................................................................ 4
- Scope ............................................................................................................................... 5
- Intermodal flows of the Chemical Industry ........................................ 6
- Current and expected Barriers ............................................................................ 17
- Recommendations how to increase the intermodal share ........................... 21
This document is intended for information only and sets out a report on Intermodal Transport Network Development. The information contained in this report is provided in good faith and, while it is accurate as far as the authors are aware, no representations or warranties are made with regard to its completeness. It is not intended to be a comprehensive report to all the detailed aspects of intermodal Transport Network Development. No responsibility will be assumed by Cefic in relation to the information contained in this report.
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Executive Summary
The goal of the European Union to shift 30% of road transport to intermodal means is considered very ambitious. The chemical industry has a strong commitment to contribute to achieving this goal. For that reason Cefic initiated an issue team to evaluate options of further increasing the usage of intermodal transport and to highlight those aspects in need of improvement to enable such modal shift.
Due to the lack of data on current and potential future intermodal transport flows of the chemical industry, a survey was undertaken to help identify the main chemical transport corridors and volumes, as well as bottlenecks and barriers. Thirteen major chemical companies and fifteen logistics service providers took part in the survey.
The survey has shown that, while the chemical industry has intermodal traffic all over Europe, the main current flows run between the Benelux, Germany, and Northern Italy. When comparing the intermodal flows to the total transport flows of the chemical industry, it becomes evident that the main transport corridors already have a high share of intermodal transport today. The participants in the survey from the chemical industry have identified in total about 1.4 million tons that might be shifted towards intermodal transport solutions (increase by 17%), if the necessary conditions would be met.
The participants in the survey were asked for the main reasons for not using intermodal transport. The following issues have been identified as the top 5 obstacles that hinder a more extensive use of intermodal solutions:
- Costs not competitive in comparison to road transport
- Missing intermodal connections, especially for France, Spain, and Eastern Europe
- Insufficient frequency or capacity of intermodal connections leading to longer transport times in comparison to road transport
- Last mile solutions insufficient or missing
- Insufficient or missing terminal infrastructure.
In the current state of intermodal transport in Europe, further shifts to intermodal transports will be difficult. To reach the required modal shift the following measures should be taken by the different stakeholders involved in intermodal transport:
- Policy and regulations: In order to enable an increase in cross-border intermodal transport, more international harmonization at technical, legal, and organizational level is needed (inter-operability). Public funding should be restricted to the development of intermodal infrastructure, creating equal market conditions for every transport mode and preventing distortion of competition.
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- Railway companies and infrastructure managers need to develop a more holistic and international view of the intermodal market, with a more transparent and comparable set of services securing high reliability and competitive prices.
- Intermodal operators and logistics service providers need to optimise the transparency of intermodal solutions to their customers and increase collaboration among each other to enable new intermodal connections that are necessary to further push intermodal transport.
- Chemical companies need to take a more active role in evaluating the most sustainable and efficient mode of transport for each corridor and define expectations and objectives to their respective service providers. Their willingness to increase the share of intermodal transport should be demonstrated by actively supporting the development of intermodal alternatives.
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Background and Objectives
The Transport Whitepaper “Roadmap to a Single European Transport Area – Towards a competitive and resource-efficient transport system” highlights the importance of developing a ‘core network’ of strategic corridors which is capable of “carrying large and consolidated volumes of freight […] with high efficiency and low emissions, thanks to the extensive use of more efficient modes in multimodal combinations”.
One of the most prominent targets in this context is the EU’s ambition to shift 30% of road freight over 300 km to other modes such as rail or waterborne transport by 2030, and more than 50% by 2050. The goal is to facilitate this by efficient and green freight corridors. To meet this goal the EU has recognized that this will require the development of appropriate infrastructure, concluding that development efforts “should focus on the completion of missing links – mainly cross-border sections and bottlenecks/bypasses – and the upgrading of existing infrastructure and development of multimodal terminals at sea and river ports”.
At the same time, chemical companies have to a large extent already captured current intermodal transport opportunities, finding it difficult to further increase modal shift without jeopardizing service levels, being either constrained by lack of capacities, lack of sufficiently developed routes, lack of reliability, lack of services at competitive rates or a combination thereof.
In order to support the EU’s ambitious plan and enable even greater use of intermodal transport options, Cefic established an Issue Team “European Intermodal Transport Network Development” with the following objectives:
- To provide a macro-economic assessment of the chemical industry’s intermodal transport needs on key strategic corridors in the current situation and on a time horizon up to 2020;
- To highlight current and expected capacity bottlenecks and needs for investment in intermodal transport infrastructure (tracks and terminals) and ICT;
- To highlight the chemical industry’s intentions to further increase the share of intermodal transport in its macro-economic transport mode mix, provided that sufficient capacity, availability, and reliability of intermodal services at a competitive cost is available.
The Issue Team was composed of representatives from the chemical industry and the logistics industry (see list of members in annex). SGKV (Studiengesellschaft fuer den Kombinierten Verkehr e.V., Germany) assisted in the development of this report.
This report highlights current and expected intermodal flows of the chemical industry throughout Europe and the main current and expected barriers for using more intermodal transport, from the point of view of the major chemical companies in Europe and their logistics service providers. It also aims to identify the possibilities and required conditions to increase the intermodal share of transports, so that the targets of the European Transport White Paper can be reached.
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Scope
The scope of the current report is as follows:
- Intermodal transport from and to European destinations (EU27). This includes both intra-European transport as well as container traffic to and from deep-sea ocean ports on key strategic corridors;
- Intermodal transport combining all modes of transport (road, rail, inland waterways, and short-sea shipping). Containers, swap-bodies, and trailers are considered in the analysis.
- Special focus was put on the specific safety and security requirements of the transport of dangerous goods.
- The main focus is on the chemical industry’s requirements, acknowledging that any policy measures or actions of service providers will be taken on the basis of total intermodal transport demand, i.e. including demand from other industry sectors.
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Intermodal flows of the Chemical Industry
One of the objectives of this report is to provide up-to-date data on current and expected intermodal flows of the chemical industry, in order to allow to identify the main transport corridors, and to identify the required improvements in infrastructure and services for a sustainable intermodal market.
Due to the lack of data on intermodal transport flows of the chemical industry, the issue team decided to undertake a survey that would help identify the main transport corridors and volumes, as well as bottlenecks and barriers. Thirteen major chemical companies and fifteen logistics service providers took part in the survey (see list below).
Chemical Industry Survey Participants
- Evonik
- Dow Chemical
- Bayer MaterialScience
- BASF
- Solvay
- SABIC Polymers
- ExxonMobil Chemical
- INEOS
- Shell Chemicals
- Lyondellbasell
- Mapei
- ARKEMA
- Borealis
Logistics Service Providers Survey Participants
- HAESAERTS INTERMODAL
- Gcatrans
- Bertschi AG
- Interbulk Group
- LKW WALTER
- DB Schenker BTT GmbH
- Bay Logistik GmbH + Co.KG
- Kube&Kubenz
- Alfred Talke GmbH & Co KG
- Europea de Contenedores, S.A.
- h. Freund GmbH
- Nijhof-Wassink
- VOTG Tanktainer GmbH
- Marenzana Spa
- EWALS Intermodal NV
Figure 1: Participants of the survey
How the Survey was Performed
Participants of the chemical industry were asked to indicate their ten most significant transport connections in terms of volume, including their respective intermodal share on these connections. Additionally, both the chemical companies and the logistics service providers were asked to identify potential intermodal connections, which are at this moment not offered by the transport industry but which may be subject to intermodal shifts of chemical goods if the basic conditions to use these intermodal connections were improved (transit times, terminal availability, costs etc.).
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Basis for the analysis of intermodal flows of the chemical industry were 23 main chemical clusters identified by Cefic. These clusters were offered to the participants as reference to identify their main current and future product flows between and within countries.
Main Current Intermodal Flows of the Chemical Companies
The overall intermodal transport volume of the 13 chemical companies participating in the survey adds up to 8.2 million tons, which is 16% of the total transport volumes of these companies (52 million tons). The 52 million tonnes of total transport volumes of these 13 chemical companies are estimated to represent about 20% of the overall transport volume of all chemical companies in Europe.
The results of the survey show that the most used intermodal transport combination is “road-rail” (72%). Short-sea shipping represents 27%, mainly related to transport from/to the clusters in Great Britain and Iberia. Intermodal inland waterway transport is currently very little used (1%).
The survey has shown that, while the chemical industry has connections all over Europe, the main current intermodal flows run between the Benelux countries (with significant volumes to and from Antwerp as a main hub for the chemical industry), Germany, Northern Italy, and Great Britain. These main chemical flows and directions basically coincide with the main total intermodal flows, as identified, for example, by the annual reports of UIRR.
Since the flows to and from Great Britain are by definition intermodal (because of the need for cross-Channel transport), these flows are not further considered in this report.
The survey participants of the chemical industry were also asked to name their ten most important connections (all modes of transport) and the respective share of intermodal transport for each connection. These connections were used to model the main transport flows of the chemical industry, in order to provide a representative image of the current transport market for the chemical industry and to identify the potential of further shifting volumes to intermodal transport on these connections.
Comparing intermodal flows with the total volumes of the chemical industry (see figure 2 and 3), it becomes evident that the main transport corridors between Benelux, Germany and Northern Italy already have a high share of intermodal volumes today. For example, the average share of intermodal volumes of chemical goods originating from Germany is 56%, from Benelux 54% and from Italy 63% (see figure 4a). France, on the other hand, has an average of only 15% of intermodal volumes.
Figure 2: Main intermodal transport flows of the chemical industry participants in the survey
Figure 3: Main total transport flows of the chemical industry participants in this survey
Figure 4a: Transport volumes and expected increases by country of origin of the chemical industry participants in the survey on their ten main connections
Origin | Total Volumes2 2011 (1000 t/a) | Total Intermodal Volumes 2011 (1000 t/a) | Avg. Intermodal Share (%) | Potential Intermodal Volumes 2020 (1000 t/a) | Potential Intermodal Increase (%)
------------ | ------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------ | -------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------ | --------------------------------
France | 2,094.8 | 333.2 | 15 | 371.2 | 11
Germany | 2,884.6 | 1,195.6 | 56 | 1,502.8 | 32
Great Britain| 624.9 | 424.5 | 69 | 426.9 | 1
Italy | 298.0 | 122.8 | 63 | 124.5 | 1
Benelux | 2,020.2 | 1,116.5 | 54 | 1,149.1 | 2
Poland | 70.0 | 9.5 | 11 | 9.5 | 0
Spain | 114.1 | 77.8 | 63 | 81.6 | 3
Figure 4b: Major intermodal flows of the chemical industry participants in the survey
Country of Origina | Destination | Total Volumes 2011 (1000 t/a) | Intermodal Volumes 2011 (1000 t/a) | Intermodal Share (%) | Potential Intermodal Volumes 2020 (1000 t/a) | Potential Intermodal Increase (%)
------------------- | --------------------- | -------------------------------- | ---------------------------------- | -------------------- | ------------------------------------------------ | --------------------------------
France | France (domestic) | 1,038 | 25.5 | 2 | 31.5 | 24
| Italy | 398.4 | 140.4 | 35 | 144.3 | 3
| Germany | 309 | 115.5 | 37 | 138.3 | 20
| Benelux | 190 | 37.6 | 20 | 40.5 | 8
| Spain | 105 | 14.3 | 14 | 16.5 | 16
Germany | Germany (domestic) | 1,301 | 63.3 | 5 | 93.1 | 47
| Italy | 518.6 | 437.9 | 84 | 523.1 | 19
| Great Britain | 376 | 325.1 | 86 | 370.9 | 14
| Scandinavia | 150 | 107.5 | 72 | 185.6 | 73
| Benelux | 136 | 29.390 | 22 | 44 | 50
Great Britain | Great Britain (domestic) | 67 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0
| Benelux | 263 | 145.3 | 55 | 145.2 | 0
| Italy | 214.9 | 202.2 | 94 | 202.2 | 0
| Germany | 58 | 55 | 95 | 58 | 4
| Spain | 22 | 22 | 100 | 22 | 0
Italy | Italy (domestic) | 133 | 2.7 | 2 | 2.7 | 0
| Benelux | 48 | 41.9 | 87 | 41.9 | 0
| France | 37 | 14.9 | 40 | 16.6 | 8
| Germany | 21 | 20.8 | 99 | 20.8 | 0
| Scandinavia | 18 | 17.1 | 95 | 17.1 | 0
Benelux | Benelux (domestic) | 241 | 3.4 | 1 | 3.4 | 0
| Italy | 458.4 | 419.8 | 92 | 444.2 | 6
| Great Britain | 432.7 | 300.4 | 69 | 304.1 | 1
| Spain | 275.4 | 120.3 | 44 | 121.5 | 1
| Scandinavia | 203.7 | 127.4 | 63 | 129.5 | 2
Figure 5: Comparison of total and intermodal volumes - Germany
Figure 6: Share of intermodal volumes in Benelux by origin
Figure 7: Comparison of total and intermodal volumes - Benelux
Figure 8: Comparison of total and intermodal volumes – France and Spain
Figure 9: Comparison of total and intermodal volumes – Italy
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Further Potential Growth in Intermodal Volumes
In addition to the potential increases along the existing main flows of chemical volumes that were discussed before (see figure 4a), participants of the survey were also asked to identify new potential corridors for intermodal transports that are not in use today but may be interesting for intermodal shifts in the future. As for these new intermodal connections that are currently not offered on the market and can only be performed by road, the chemical industry sees potential for volumes to be shifted to and from France and to and from the CEE countries, especially Russia and the South-East of Europe.
Including already existing connections, participants from the chemical industry see most of the growth potential in France, Germany, Benelux, Italy, and Spain (see figure 10). Also Russia and Turkey are seen as growing markets.
The participants of the survey from the chemical industry have identified in total about 1.4 million tons that may be shifted towards intermodal transport solutions, if the requirements would be met. Those include a better-developed international infrastructure, a transparent intermodal market, and competitive cost structures and service levels.
Considering the current intermodal volume of 8.2 million tons per year, this would allow an increase of about 17 per cent. Those predictions underline the willingness of the chemical industry to actively support intermodal transport as a sustainable transport solution
