Smart Tianjin Port to Bolster Export-Oriented Economy

Automated container cranes and driverless transport vehicles are busy unloading and carrying containers at Tianjin Port in Tianjin Municipality, north China.

Smart port construction, which utilizes an array of technologies such as 5G, AI, autonomous driving, and cloud computing, has transformed Tianjin Port, which has built the world’s first intelligent zero-carbon terminal.

The intelligent container terminal involved an investment of 5.2 billion yuan (about 731 million U.S. dollars). The investment in smart container terminals is at the same level as that for traditional ones, but smart ports have higher efficiency, said Yang Jiemin, vice president of Tianjin Port Group.

The smart terminal increases the operating efficiency of a single gantry crane by more than 40 percent and reduces labor costs by 60 percent.

Tianjin Port is striving to become an upgraded green, smart, and hub port to help enhance the overall competitiveness of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei city cluster, said Chu Bin, chairman of Tianjin Port Group.

To help inland cities expand trade, Tianjin Port has launched rail-sea intermodal services and opened over 120 marketing outlets across the country, Chu said. Its shipping routes can reach more than 500 ports in over 180 countries and regions.

Over the past decade, Tianjin Port’s container throughput has increased from 13 million 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs) to 22 million TEUs, making it one of the world’s ten busiest container ports.