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The Kerala Cabinet has accepted the bid of Adani Ports and SEZ for the Vizhinjam International Deepwater Seaport (VISL) container terminal PPP project in India.

Adani Ports and SEZ has been the only bidder for the project. Two other teams were shortlisted, ESSAR Ports and a consortium composed by Srei Infrastructure and OHL, but finally they do not submit any bid for the project.

The port is expected to be one of the largest ports in the world. It is envisaged to provide a total of 2000 m of quay length in three phases. The project involves the development of a container transshipment terminal with a capacity to load 600,000 twenty foot equivalent units (TEUs) a year initially, which can be scaled up to 1 million TEUs as per demand. Once completed, ships with a capacity of even 18,000 TEU could dock.

The project would be developed on a design, build, finance, operate and transfer (DBFOT) basis. It would have a contract period of 40 years which could be extended by another 20 years.

First phase of the project would cost about Rs75.25 billion (US$1176 million). Adani Ports and SEZ has plans to invest about Rs24.54 billion (US$383.5 million). The firm is also seeking a grant of Rs16.35 billion (US$255.5 million) for the project.

Vizhinjam is a locality of Thiruvananthapuram city in the state of Kerala. Vizhinjam is a natural port, which is located close to the international ship route and has a natural depth of 24 metres.

We have recently reported about several ports PPP projects globally:

• Design, build and operate an intermodal terminal at Moorebank in Sydney - Australia
• Petlim container terminal - Turkey
• Mombasa 2nd Container Terminal - Kenya
• Livorno Port ferry terminal concession - Italy
• Rosslare Europort concession - Irealnd