Tides surge across Bohe Bay, where giant vessels await their berths.
The 300,000-tonne crude oil terminal main works at the Bohe New Port Area of Maoming Port recently passed completion acceptance.
This milestone victory for a provincial key project is not merely the completion of a massive marine structure, but a landmark moment in Maoming's years of deep cultivation along the coast and its long-held dream of a great port.
From planning the Binhai New Area and launching the development of the Bohe New Port Area more than a decade ago, to the current formation of a 300,000-tonne crude oil berth, Maoming's port construction has advanced step by step, continuously transforming the grand blueprint of "prospering toward the sea" into a tangible reality of wide waters, deep channels, and clustered industries, laying solid support for Maoming to build itself into a strong maritime city and a strong port-industry city.
The eastern zone of the Bohe New Port Area of Maoming Port. Photo courtesy of Maoming Port Group.
Prospering by the port is an innate gene in Maoming's urban development.
For a long period in the past, Maoming possessed a long coastline yet faced the longstanding bottleneck of "having the sea but no great port."
As a major domestic petrochemical city, local petrochemical industries relied heavily on maritime shipping for raw material imports and product exports, but the lack of large deep-water berths meant that super-large oil tankers could not berth directly, requiring lightering and transshipment at outer anchorages, which increased logistics costs and constrained the expansion and upgrading of port-side industries.
More than a decade ago, the municipal party committee and government proposed the Binhai New Area development strategy, pooling the city's resources to plan and build the Bohe New Port Area, officially raising the curtain on constructing a modern coastal great port.
Land was reclaimed through dredging and filling, creating approximately 10 square kilometers of port-side industrial park on the Bohe shoals.
Infrastructure such as navigation channels, wharves, and pipeline corridors was continuously advanced, step by step filling in the port's shortcomings.
This long construction journey has embodied the concerted efforts of the entire city and could not have been achieved without the years of dedication and sacrifice by key project supervisors, builders, and frontline workers.
The landing of the Donghua Energy alkane resource comprehensive utilization project drove a hundred-billion-level green chemical industry cluster to take root along the coast.
The pattern of port and industry coexisting and thriving together gradually took shape, laying a solid industrial foundation for the landing of this 300,000-tonne crude oil terminal.
The main works of the 300,000-tonne crude oil terminal at the Bohe New Port Area of Maoming Port. Photo by correspondent Zhang Chunhao.
The 300,000-tonne crude oil terminal that passed completion acceptance this time is the core hub project of the Bohe New Port Area.
The project includes a new 300,000-tonne crude oil berth with a total length of 404 meters and a designed annual throughput capacity of 16.5 million tonnes, comprising six unit works including harbor basin dredging, terminal main structure, pipeline corridor bridges, and supporting facilities.
Once the terminal is completed and put into operation, the changes it brings will be multi-layered.
First, it fills the gap in direct berthing capacity for VLCC super-large crude oil tankers in South China.
Going forward, 300,000-tonne giant crude oil vessels can berth directly at the Bohe New Port Area without needing mid-route lightering and transshipment at outer ports, significantly shortening shipping time, reducing petrochemical raw material transport costs, directly empowering leading enterprises such as Maoming Petrochemical and Donghua Energy, and stabilizing the supply chain security of the green chemical industry cluster.
The annual throughput capacity of 16.5 million tonnes will greatly unleash the port's cargo potential, enhance Maoming Port's competitiveness in western Guangdong and even along the South China coast, and improve the level of port openness.
Second, the upgrading of port capacity will further amplify the advantages of port-side industries.
The port is a prerequisite for port-side industries.
A deep-water great port can attract more petrochemical new materials, marine energy, and bulk commodity storage and transportation projects to land, promote industry chain extension, supplementation, and strengthening, help Maoming build itself into a strong manufacturing city, and drive the continued growth of the marine economy.
At the same time, the rise of the port will also improve the city's comprehensive transportation system, linking with expressway ring roads and railway projects to build a multimodal transport corridor integrating road, rail, river, and sea, supporting Maoming's development toward the east, south, and the sea.
The 300,000-tonne crude oil terminal. Photo by correspondent Zhang Chunhao.
The achievements have not come easily, but completion acceptance does not mean all work is finished, and the follow-up tasks remain arduous.
According to the meeting requirements, all participating construction units must rectify the issues raised during acceptance within a prescribed time limit and implement closed-loop resolution, solidly carry out equipment operation and maintenance and safety production, standardize archive management, and steadily advance the remaining works and overall completion acceptance.
Large ports are long-cycle systematic projects.
Even after the terminal main structure is completed, a full set of equipment commissioning, safety verification, and port supporting facility improvements must still be completed before formal operation can begin.
Safety is the lifeline of port operations.
Crude oil terminals are hazardous chemical handling port areas, and subsequent operation and maintenance, loading and unloading operations, and environmental control must strictly comply with regulations, holding the two bottom lines of safety production and marine ecological protection, safeguarding the marine ecology of Bohe Bay while developing port resources.
Looking back on more than a decade of construction at the Bohe New Port Area, from dredging and filling shoals to create land, to the successive completion of wharves and berths, this was not simply building a terminal but a reshaping of urban space and industrial structure.
When the Binhai New Area strategy was implemented years ago, representatives from various sectors went deep into the construction site for field research and offered suggestions.
From 2011 to 2013, the author was appointed by the municipal government as a "Municipal Key Project Supervisor," visiting the site multiple times to discuss countermeasures with port construction leaders and workers, conduct field inspections, and put forward recommendations.
Port construction has never been the task of a single department but a systematic project involving the whole city working as one.
Only through the coordinated advancement of port construction, industrial investment promotion, road network support, and ecological protection could today's hundred-billion-level port-side industrial cluster take root.
If the port thrives, the Binhai New Area thrives; if the coast thrives, Maoming's urban pattern opens up.
The Bohe New Port Area has enabled Maoming to turn from an inland petrochemical city toward the forefront of coastal openness.
Standing at a new starting point, the 300,000-tonne crude oil terminal will become a new fulcrum for Maoming to strengthen itself toward the sea.
A deep-water great port opens a window to the outside world, with bulk commodities continuously arriving in Maoming by sea, undergoing industrial processing, and then being shipped from the port to all parts of the country.
The deep integration of port, industry, and city drives employment and attracts investment, turning the coastal area from barren flats into an industrial hotspot.
In the future, relying on the Bohe New Port Area, Maoming can continue to expand port functions, develop new business formats such as bulk commodity warehousing, marine equipment, and coastal logistics, and continuously enrich the substance of the marine economy.
Tides surge at Bohe, and the great port sets sail.
From blueprint planning to port construction on tidal flats, from dredging and filling to giant vessels being able to berth, through more than a decade of continuous struggle, Maoming's dream of a great port has been steadily brought to reality.
The acceptance of the main works of the 300,000-tonne crude oil terminal is a milestone victory and an entirely new starting point.
As long as follow-up project construction continues to be carried out well, the bottom lines of safety and ecology are firmly held, port-side industries are strengthened, and the advantages of a deep-water great port are well utilized, Maoming will surely better unleash its coastal location potential, ride the waves in the high-quality development tide along the coast of western Guangdong, and strive to write a new chapter of prospering toward the sea and strengthening toward the sea.
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