On 30 January 2019, the 4th national ENERGY BARGE workshop took place in Budapest. The workshop was part of the joint conference DanuBeGreen 2019 that was organised together with the Hungarian-Slovakian CEF-funded (Connecting Europe Facility) project “National Port Development Masterplan”.

Preceding the workshop, participants had the opportunity to take part in a site visit at Csepel Freeport. During this site visit, the commercial docks, the grain storehouse, as well as the sites of Ferroport were visited. The forklift, which was recently purchased in the frame of the ENERGY BARGE project to handle biomass of different groups in the Csepel Freeport, was presented to the participants. Biomass constitutes a new commodity group for the port. The small scale investment shall contribute to the aim to develop the port into a biomass hub in the future. Therefore, it will be a pilot exercise to demonstrate how the biomass handling can be launched as a new service and how it can contribute to the attraction of biomass cargo.

© ARBIO

After a brief networking coffee, Szávó Sztilkovics (MAHART-Freeport) welcomed all participants in the name of the ENERGY BARGE project, before Zoltan Haasz provided an introduction to the project. Before the session was concluded with Ann-Kathrin Kaufmann’s (BioCampus Straubing GmbH) presentation of the ENERGY BARGE modal shift platform, four interesting presentations from our guest speakers were held.

© MAHART-Freeport, Zoltan Író

Márk Alföldy-Boruss, head of the department for decarbonisation within the Hungarian Ministry for Innovation and Technology, highlighted the novelties brought by the amendment of the EU Renewable Energy Directive (EU 2018/2001). Ágnes Törőcsik (REKK Foundation) elaborated on the specific effects the new directive will have on the biomass sector in Hungary and the Danube region. After János Matáncsi gave an overview of the possibilities of wood based biomass in Hungary, Tibor Orbán (President of the Association of Hungarian District Heating Enterprises) was the final guest speaker with his contribution on the possible role of biomass in heat production for Budapest district heating systems.

© left: MAHART-Freeport, Zoltan Író; right: ARBIO

In the afternoon session, the audience moved to the ENERGY BARGE B2B matchmaking event organised by MAHART-Freeport. Scheduled in advance, actors along the supply chains could book brief 15-minute business dates with potential partners of interest to facilitate first contacts. Overall, 20 B2B meetings were requested by the participants. The feedback from the participants indicated that the B2B meetings proved to offer favourable opportunities to exchange information and expand business networks in the sector of Danube logistics. Overall, 170 participants turned the DanuBeGreen 2019 event into a successful conference.