Polder Terminal: A risk based design

Polder Terminal: A risk based design

Lendering, K.T.

Vrijling, J.K. (mentor)
Jonkman, S.N. (mentor)
De Gijt, J.G. (mentor)
Hoes, O.A.C. (mentor)
Peters, D.J. (mentor)

Civil Engineering and Geosciences

Hydraulic Engineering

2012-10-26

New container ports are mostly constructed on low lying coastal areas or in shallow coastal waters. The quay wall and terminal yard are then raised to a level well above mean sea level to insure safety against inundation. The resulting ‘conventional terminal’ requires large volumes of good quality fill material often dredged from the sea which is costly. Royal HaskoningDHV developed the concept of a container terminal with a “polder yard”. The yard would lie below the outside water level and be surrounded by a combined quay wall flood defense structure. A water drainage system is required to drain excess water from the polder. This master thesis investigates the technical and economic feasibility. Important conditions for the feasibility of a polder terminal are low conductive (impermeable) subsoil, which limit the amount of seepage water entering the polder, and high reclamation cost. The polder terminal is technically feasible; a conceptual design is made for a case study in Tuas, Singapore. The ‘polder terminal’ could save 10 to 25% of the total cost (investment and risk) due to the lower reclamation cost. The exact saving depends on the polder depth which is bounded by uplifting failure of the polder yard. The increase in cost due to the risk of inundation and water drainage system is insufficient to counteract the large savings possible. The investments, risk and total cost of both the conventional and polder terminal are shown in the graph, where the minimum total cost of the polder terminal are lower than those of the conventional terminal.

polder
polder terminal
container terminal
flood risk

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:0e3ed140-3c52-4c5a-9079-9b80d88ed1f1

Student theses

master thesis

(c) 2012 Lendering, K.T.