The specialized fleet of Delta-Pilot, the branch of the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority, almost doubled dredging in 2018 compared with 2017, to 1.341 million cubic meters. More than a third of this volume (497,300 cubic meters) is the result of the operation of the Meotid dredger in Mariupol and Berdiansk ports of the Sea of Azov. Last year, operational dredging was also carried out in the port of Izmail, on the Kherson marine and Bug-Dnieper-Limansky canals, as well as on the Danube-Black Sea approach canal.
Currently the specialized fleet of the Delta-Pilot branch is undergoing planned preparation for new navigation: the classification and dock repairs are carried out at all ships.
Ship repairs are scheduled to be completed in the second quarter of 2019 and, upon termination of spawning (June 1–15), they will proceed to the implementation of operational dredging.
As reported, the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority announced two tenders for dredging in Berdiansk and Mariupol ports totaling 1.85 million cubic meters and 1.9 million cubic meters. The expected cost of work is UAH 430 million without VAT and UAH 460 million without VAT respectively.
One troy ounce=31.10 grams
A group of lawmakers from the Verkhovna Rada have registered bill No. 9507 proposing that sale of plastic bags in stores and other retail outlets is banned. According to the explanatory note to the bill, it is proposed to prohibit the implementation of ultra-light and light plastic bags. Exceptions are biodegradable bags and ultralight bags for meat, fish, and bulk solids. In addition, the bill provides for mandatory labeling of plastic bags.
The bill aims at reducing the amount of safe waste from polyethylene.
According to the information on the website of the parliament, 60 MPs were the initiators of the bill, including Boryslav Bereza (member of no faction), Serhiy Kiral (Samopomich), Olena Sotnik (Samopomich), Mustafa Nayyem (Petro Poroshenko Bloc), Oleksiy Mushak (Petro Poroshenko Bloc) and others.
Westinghouse (the United States) is working on resumption of production processes required for fabrication of fuel for VVER-440 type reactors, Westinghouse President José Emeterio Gutiérrez has said in an interview with the Energoatom Ukrainy magazine.
“Currently, Westinghouse is resuming all production processes in this area of production and will be ready to supply fuel for the VVER-440 [reactors] after signing a commercial agreement with Energoatom,” he said.
The company president also said that Westinghouse had previously supplied fuel for reactors of this type at Finland’s Loviisa nuclear power plant (NPP).
“The updated design of this fuel, which will meet the needs of Ukrainian reactors at the Rivne NPP, has already been determined,” he said.
Regarding the supply of fuel assemblies produced by Westinghouse to reactor three of the Rivne NPP (VVER-1000 reactor), which currently consumes Russian-made fuel, Gutiérrez expressed the hope that the switch of the reactor to Westinghouse fuel, as planned, would be carried out in 2021.
Grain Alliance, a large agricultural producer in Ukraine, intends to increase its elevator capacity by 100,000 tonnes in the coming years, to 350,000 tonnes.
“In the coming years, we plan to add up to 100,000 tonnes to Grain Alliance’s capacities. But we will focus on the throughput capacity of the existing facilities. We plan to bring the average figure for the holding to 2.5 circulations at all elevator enterprises in the near future,” the company’s press service told Interfax-Ukraine.
The company clarified that in 2018 Grain Alliance increased its land bank by 3,000 hectares.
“Our company does not aim to build up the land bank at any cost. We understand well that land is not a goal, but the means of achieving a goal. Accordingly, we are not ready to overpay for land and infrastructure. However, the company is gradually raising its land bank, in particular, due to growth in villages where the holding is doing business,” the press service noted.
Grain Alliance cultivates more than 50,000 hectares of agricultural land in Kyiv, Cherkasy, Poltava, Khmelnytsky, and Chernihiv regions.
