Benchmark for seaport sustainability

This report presents a benchmark for measuring the sustainability performance of seaports. This benchmark was applied to fourteen ports in the Netherlands, other European countries and North America. The data used for the benchmark mainly cover recent years (2015-2018) and include an earlier reference point where possible, usually 2010, to gain insights into longer-term trends. Sustainability performance is assessed in the following areas: climate, renewable energy, air quality, water quality, maritime waste, modal split, community relations and sustainability strategy (vision). Other sustainability topics, for example use of space, safety and nature development have not been included in this benchmark because of the difficulty of developing accurate indicators and datasets.

The benchmark serves two purposes. First, to identify the sustainability progress of individual ports. Second, to identify frontrunners and best practices, which can stimulate the sustainable development of seaports in general. The benchmark is not suitable for scoring or ranking ports, because of their heterogeneous nature.