cotac Joint Venture in Ludwigshafen begins operations

Tank container cleaning and repairs with trimodal transport connections

Ludwigshafen, 25 April 2024

The new cotac site in Ludwigshafen, Kaiserwörthhafen, is the first facility of the Multimodal Tank Care GmbH joint venture – a partnership between the cotac group and Contargo – to go into operation. cotac stands for complete tank care, and offers certified quality standards for cleaning, repairing and maintaining tank containers at twelve locations worldwide. In Ludwigshafen, the full service also includes cleaning and workshop services for tank containers measuring up to 52 feet. It is the first location of its kind with a trimodal transport connection.

At the chemicals hub in Ludwigshafen, the cotac operation primarily cleans tank containers that were loaded with dangerous goods or harmless chemical products. The cleaning operation complies with the EFTCO standard (European Federation of Tank Cleaning Organisations) and is audited and certified. Up to 20,000 cleanings and 7,000 repairs can be carried out annually. Periodic maintenance and modifications also take place in the workshops.

According to Dirk Müller, Site Manager at cotac Ludwigshafen, “Our customers benefit from the fact that we are located in the immediate vicinity of a trimodal container terminal. This enables us to offer them all the services in accordance with established quality standards and brought together at a single site. For us, the fast and flexible turnaround time of tank containers is our absolute focus.” In addition, the trimodal transport connections give customers the opportunity to reduce truck journeys and thus further decrease their CO₂ footprint. Tank containers can also be heated with steam at six locations, and empty tanks can be temporarily stored in the company's own depot before and after cleaning and workshop services.

Jürgen Albersmann, CEO of Contargo, says, “We can now offer customers in the Rhine-Neckar metropolitan region an even more comprehensive service for tank containers, available immediately. To enable as many shippers as possible to benefit from these services, we are currently increasing the storage capacity for tank containers at our Ludwigshafen terminal from 430 to 730 spaces.”

The partnership between cotac and Contargo provides the chemical industry with the ideal conditions for efficient trimodal turnaround with reduced downtimes for cleaning, repair and maintenance work: A strong partnership that will set up additional service locations with these advantages in the future.

Photographic material can be found here.

ABOUT THE COTAC GROUP

The cotac group is one of the leading service providers of technical services for tank containers, such as tank cleaning, repair and depot services worldwide, with twelve locations in Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and France, the USA, Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand. cotac specialises in cleaning containers holding chemical products, liquefied gases and foodstuffs. In addition to repairs to tank containers, road tankers, intermediate bulk containers (IBCs) and mini pressure tanks (MPTs), the portfolio also includes modifications, maintenance and certifications. Around 700 employees worldwide provide reliable, quality-assured services for all aspects of tank containers. The cotac group is a subsidiary of the HOYER Group, one of the leading providers of logistics solutions for the handling and transport of liquid goods in the chemical, gas, food and mineral oil industries.
www.cotac-group.com

ABOUT CONTARGO

With an annual transport volume of two million TEU (Twenty-foot Equivalent Units), Contargo is among the largest container logistics networks in Europe. Contargo integrates container transport between the Western Ports, the German North Sea ports and the European hinterland. Contargo has 24 container terminals in Germany, France and Switzerland, as well as other locations in Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Poland. The company also operates its own shipping and railway lines. More than 1,340 employees generated an annual turnover of EUR 654 million in 2023.
www.contargo.net