Dredged material management in the port of Hamburg

Hamburg harbour is the largest port in Germany. Dredging activities go back to the early 19th century. Since then dredged material has been beneficially used for agricultural purposes or for upgrading and landfill. Due to the pollution of the River Elbe the sediments are contaminated with all sorts of pollutants. The ecological problems of former dredged material disposal sites were realised in the 1970s and they began to form a big problem in the 1980s. This led to an extensive dredged material research programme and within ten years treatment and disposal were radically changed, so that now highly sophisticated technology is used which costs about US $50 million a year. This cannot be a long-term strategy. The aim has to be a clean River Elbe so that the sediment can be used for agricultural purposes or dumped into the river or sea.