Services

Services provided by the port (I_14)

I) General services

General services are those which the port users can use without needing to request them, along with those necessary for compliance of the functions assigned to the Port Authorities. Huelva Port Authority provides the following general services:

• Managing, coordinating and controlling terrestrial and maritime port traffic.
• Coordinating and controlling the operations associated to the port and commercial services and other activities.
• The signalling, beaconing and other navigation aids that help the vessel to approach and access the port, along with its inner beaconing.
• The police service in communal areas, without prejudice to the jurisdictions of other authorities.
• Lighting in the communal areas.
• Standard cleaning service of the water and land communal areas. The cleaning of wharves and forecourts as the result of the operations to deposit and handle goods, or spillages and polluting marine discharges are not included in this service.
• The emergency response and prevention services, as established in civil protection legislation, in conjunction with the competent authorities in the field of civil protection, fire protection and firefighting, rescue and pollution prevention.
• The basic access to the railway infrastructure and the basic access envisaged in Article 46 of Railway Sector Act 38/2015, of 29 September, or minimum access package referred to in Annex II of DIRECTIVE 2012/34/EU OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 21 November 2012 establishing a single European railway area.

In general, the Port Authority is tasked with providing the general services, without prejudice to its management being entrusted to third parties when that does not put safety at risk or implies exercising authority.

On 31 March 2015, a four-year service contract was signed between Huelva Port Authority and the Spanish Maritime Safety Agency to provide the general service of managing, coordinating and controlling port maritime traffic. That contract, pursuant to the Partnership Framework Agreement between the Spanish Maritime Safety Agency and the Puertos del Estado Public Body, signed in March 2014, regulates the relevant levels of service. In 2020, the extension of that agreement was signed and will continue in force for a further year until April 2021.

II) Port Services

Port services are those that are necessary to run the ports in order to be able to carry out the operations associated to maritime traffic, safely, efficiency, consistency, continuity and non-discrimination, and which are provided in the territorial sphere of the Port Authorities.

These activities, which are increasingly more diversified and complex, must be provided by private companies on a free competition basis, with the legally-established exceptions, while guaranteeing, in any event, compliance by the applicant of the conditions and requirements envisaged by that Law.

The provision of the port services will require the relevant licence to be obtained from the Port Authority, which will only be granted after approval of the relevant Regulatory Specifications and Specific Requirements of the service in question.

In that regard, port services are the nautical-technical services (pilotage, port towage and berthing & unberthing), passenger services, vessel waste collection services and cargo handling services.

However, EU Regulation 2017/352 of the European Parliament and of the Council was approved on 15 February 2017 and established a new common legislative framework for the provision of port services and common rules on the financial transparency of European ports and included bunkering as a port service. Even though any EU Regulation is a legal act as defined by Article 288 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union that is generally applicable and is binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all EU countries, Puertos del Estado is working on a legal provision to transpose that Regulation into the Spanish legal system. The procedure envisaged in the legislation will then have to be established to grant the relevant service licences and including the approval of the Specific Specifications.

Until that has occurred, pursuant to current legislation, the situation of the Port Services at the Port of Huelva is as follows:

Technical-nautical services

Pilotage Service

The tender specifications to award the licence to provide the pilotage port service at the Port of Huelva were approved by the Board of Directors at its meeting on 26 June 2013.

At its meeting on 11 December 2013, Huelva Port Authority’s Board of Directors awarded a licence to provide the Pilotage Port Service at the Port of Huelva to the Corporación de Prácticos del Puerto y Ría de Huelva, S.L.P., for a ten (10) year period, subject to the conditions and requirements established in the Specific Specifications of the Pilotage Port Service at the Port of Huelva and in the tendering specifications.

Berthing and Unberthing Service

Huelva Port Authority is current drafting the new specifications to regulate the service, in accordance with the model sent by OPPE, which includes what is established in Regulation of the European Union (EU) 2017/352 of the European Parliament and of the Council.

However, until the regulatory specifications are approved, the Board of Directors of the Huelva Port Authority, during its meeting on 25 June 2020, extended the expired berthing port service licence for a year and in any event until the specifications are approved.

Towage service

Huelva Port Authority is current drafting the new specifications to regulate the service, in accordance with the model sent by OPPE, which includes what is established in the Regulation of the European Union (EU) 2017/352 of the European Parliament and of the Council.

Therefore, until the regulatory specifications are approved, the Board of Directors of the Huelva Port Authority, during its meeting on 12 November 2020, extended the expired towage port service licence for a year and in any event until the specifications are approved. The smaller tug licence was also extended in the meeting on 20 February 2020.

Vessel Waste collection service

After the Port Services Committee had its say and the hearing had been completed, Huelva Port Authority sent the draft Specifications together with the full proceedings to OPPE on 25 August 2020, in order for the latter to issue a binding report prior to its approval.

While the report from the OPPE remains pending, the Board of Directors of this Port Authority, during its meetings on 25 June 2020 and 21 November 2020, extended the licences for the collection of waste in the MARPOL V (solid waste) and MARPOL I (oily liquids) annexes, respectively, as the licences had expired, for a year and in any event until the specifications are approved.

Passenger service

Once model has been received from the OPPE, work will still need to begin on drafting the specifications regulating the service in order to include what is established in the Regulation of the European Union (EU) 2017/352 of the European Parliament and of the Council.

Freight Handling Service

Drafting and approving the relevant regulatory specification is pending the OPPE producing the draft framework document incorporating what is established in EU Regulation 2017/352 of the European Parliament and Council.

 

III) Commercial Services

These services are commercial activities that, while not classified as port services, are linked to the port activity. Pursuant to the applicable legislation, this type of services is provided following a competitive call and duly authorised by the Port Authority and complying with the relevant specific terms and concessions.

Numerous activities are carried out to provide this type of service at the Port of Huelva.

In 2019, the Board of Directors of Huelva Port Authority agreed to the provisional authorisation of a ITSAS GAS BUNKER SUPPLY, S.L., to provide the bulk liquefied natural gas supply commercial services to vessels in the Zone II anchorage by bunkering barge at the Port of Huelva, until Huelva Port Authority approves the specific provisions of that service. Subsequently, authorisation was given to expand the service to supply LNG, using the same "OIZMENDI" bunkering barge, to the public wharves of the Huelva Outer Port.

 

Similarly, the aforementioned Board provisionally authorised ESK, S.A. to provide the commercial service of supplying Liquefied Natural Gas to vessels by means of shore mobile services, pursuant to the Specifications regulating the LNG supply to vessels by means of shore mobile services in the Port of Huelva Service Area.

IV) Maritime signalling service

This service is aimed at the installation, maintenance, control and inspection of active or passive radioelectric, electronic, acoustic or visual devices, aimed at improving safety of navigation and movements of vessel along the Spanish coast and, where applicable, to confirm the position of vessels en route.

The provision of this service by the Huelva Port Authority is reflected in the geographical zone allocated for those purposes².

The beaconing areas of Water Zones I and II at the Port of Huelva can likewise be seen in the following link.

2 See General Map of the Port of Huelva.

Number of companies operating in the port pursuant to a concession, authorisation or licence (I_15)

Real land used for commercial purposes (I_16)

Land area usable for concessions (m2)	5,246,599.70 m2
Land areas under concessions (m2)	3,437,560.45 m2
RATIO (%)	65.52 %

 

Out of the 17,161,871 m² of the total land surface of the Port of Huelva’s service areas, 5,246,599.70 m², approximately 31 %, are estimated to be fully usable for concessions. The rest of the land is subject to environmental and/or urban development limitations or is to be used for general services (communications, green spaces, etc.). In 2020, the surface area under concession was 3,846,610.53 m², out of which 3,437,560.45 m² were terrestrial occupancy.

The surface area classified in the Special Layout Plan as for port-commercial use in any of its forms is 1,633,555 m², even though, due to the extension of the Ingeniero Juan Gonzalo Wharf (both of the North and to the South) and of the South Wharf, the real surface area for port-commercial use is 1,918,113 m², where existing occupancies cover an approximate surface area of 408,174.88 m².

Percentage of tons moved at authorised and concession maritime freight terminals (I_17)

As regards the total freight traffic, they are for authorised or concession maritime freight terminals: