Driving Innovation at Smart Ports: Piers of the Future

Digital-First, Decarbonization-Ready

Port terminals around the world are navigating an increasingly complex operating environment: evolving emissions regulations, rising energy costs, tighter margins, and growing pressure from customers and investors to demonstrate progress on sustainability. Yet many terminals still face a common roadblock: they lack the tools and insights needed to turn these challenges into action.

For most operators, decarbonization is not an abstract ambition — it’s an immediate business need. But the path forward can feel uncertain and cost prohibitive. With limited time, tight resources, and an evolving regulatory landscape, how can terminals cut emissions without disrupting performance or increasing OPEX?

At NextPort, we believe that progress starts with better visibility. More specifically, it starts with the ability to monitor and understand—in real time—how energy is consumed, and how emissions are produced across every layer of terminal operations. This is where terminal-level digital twins come in.

Digital twins can help bridge the gap between sustainability goals and operational decision-making. By combining real-time equipment telemetry, activity profiling, and energy modeling, terminals gain the ability to:

• Build credible emissions baselines aligned with upcoming compliance requirements

• Identify inefficiencies and energy hotspots

• Model the operational and financial impact of electrification or automation investments

• Demonstrate funding-readiness to public or multilateral financiers

The road to net zero starts with knowing where you stand. With digital twins, operators possess the clarity to act.

Cutting carbon without raising costs

In today’s port terminal landscape, the question is no longer if operators should act on decarbonization — but how they can do so without compromising efficiency or profitability. The good news is that meaningful emissions reduction doesn’t always require large capital outlays. For many terminals, the first step is using data more effectively.

With better visibility into how terminal equipment consumes energy and emits CO₂ across daily operations, operators can unlock measurable gains — both environmental and financial. But, achieving this requires moving beyond static reports or annual carbon footprints.

Targeting operational inefficiencies

Terminals already generate large volumes of data, yet most goes unused for sustainability or performance insights. By creating a digital twin of terminal operations — connecting equipment profiles, schedules, and telemetry — operators can begin to answer critical questions:

• Which activities are contributing most to energy consumption?

• Are peak emissions linked to certain shifts, equipment types, or inefficiencies?

• What short-term changes could reduce fuel use or idle time?

Through real-time energy and activity modeling, the platform surfaces actionable insights: from improving equipment dispatching and reducing idle times, to identifying low-cost behavior changes that lower carbon intensity immediately.

Understanding the ROI of visibility

Rather than relying on assumptions or outdated averages, digital twins enable precise and dynamic energy analysis. This means terminals can:

• Quantify emissions per move, per shift, or per equipment type

• Benchmark performance across different yards or operating conditions

• Simulate how changes — like electrification or automation — would impact both carbon and cost

By connecting emissions with operational performance, terminals can evaluate the cost-benefit of sustainability decisions. The platform becomes not just a compliance tool, but a source of business intelligence — helping to align environmental goals with cost management.

From reporting to actionable decisions

For years, sustainability efforts in the terminal space have centered around reporting — emissions audits, carbon footprints, and regulatory disclosures. While these are important, they are inherently retrospective. They show where you’ve been, but not how to change course.

To meet today’s operational and environmental demands, terminal operators need tools that support real-time decision-making — not just compliance.

Beyond Compliance: Operational Intelligence for Sustainability

Digital twins give operators the ability to move from lagging reports to leading insights. Instead of reporting emissions after the fact, the platform allows teams to see how today’s activities are contributing to carbon output — and where to intervene.

For example:

• Live equipment usage can highlight inefficient routing or excessive idle times

• Shift-level energy profiles can inform more balanced workload distribution

• Peak emission moments can be correlated with container flow or gate congestion

These insights allow terminals to act on what matters most, when it matters — improving both sustainability and service delivery without waiting for the next audit cycle.

Compliance that supports business

Both EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) and FuelEU Maritime make it necessary for terminal operators to understand and report carbon impacts with increasing precision. Accurate emissions accounting will soon affect financial exposure, especially for terminals involved in ship loading, unloading, or energy supply.

A digital twin supports this by:

• Establishing a credible and verifiable baseline of terminal emissions

• Enabling continuous emissions tracking, not just annual reporting

• Supporting collaboration between terminals and shipping lines to account for onshore power, fuel switch impacts, and energy use at berth

For FuelEU, which pushes toward cleaner marine fuels and shore power, this data is equally crucial — helping terminals plan infrastructure upgrades with clarity.

Making ESG actionable

Terminals are being asked:

• What progress are you making on Scope 1 and 2 emissions?

• Are your assets aligned with science-based targets or net-zero pathways?

• How are sustainability metrics linked to your investment plans?

With a digital twin, terminals can answer these questions with precision — and use the same data to support grant applications, public-private partnerships, and green financing opportunities.

Informing smarter investments

One of the biggest barriers to decarbonization is uncertainty: Where should we invest first? What pays off? What are the operational trade-offs?

By simulating the impact of electrification, automation, or energy efficiency upgrades before implementation, terminals can:

• Prioritize high-impact actions

• Avoid stranded assets

• Justify funding proposals with data

• Build confidence across internal and external stakeholders

The result is not just compliance readiness — but strategic alignment between sustainability and business performance.

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About NextPort by Moffatt & Nichol

NextPort is a digital innovation unit launched by Moffatt & Nichol. Created to bridge the gap between infrastructure design and operational performance in the era of decarbonization. Leveraging our 75+ years as a global leader in maritime and transportation engineering, NextPort delivers digital services that help ports and terminals make smarter, faster, and more cost-effective decisions.

At NextPort, we’ve seen firsthand how data-driven planning and visibility unlock fast, cost-effective wins — from fully manual operations to semi-automated environments. Whether preparing for EU ETS, answering customer ESG requests, or simply trying to reduce fuel costs, the same principle applies: you can’t change what you can’t see.

NextPort’s digital twin enables that visibility — providing the foundation for smarter decisions. The road to net starts with action, guided by insight.

Together, NextPort and FlexTerm reflect Moffatt & Nichol’s commitment to smart, scalable, and sustainable port infrastructure — where engineering and data work side by side to deliver better outcomes for our clients and the communities they serve.

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Terminal operators pioneering the use of NextPort have shared with the industry how it is improving their operations.

Speaking at the Container Terminal Automation Conference (CTAC) in Valencia, Spain, three operators discussed their different stages of integration of the NextPort solution and the results they are already seeing.

Clients noted that the technology functions as an augmentation layer, enhancing operational efficiency, simplifying troubleshooting, and ensuring information is easier to obtain and apply effectively – in addition to feedback into the system to enable continuous improvement and learn from troubleshooting.

Clients also noted that the industrialization capabilities were important, so they could scale up.

Hein Chetcuti, Chief Transformation Officer, Malta Freeport told the conference that previously the terminal had suffered from congestion. “We could resolve 50% of the problem but the other 50% was proving impossible. No one was able to understand what was happening,” he said.

Malta Freeport had already started working with NextPort, but took the decision to harvest the data collected to create a holistic picture of what was happening at the terminal, rather than looking at data in silos.

“We decided to use the data in the control room to start uncovering what the TOS was not telling us,” he said.

From that, they were able to understand and address how human behaviors were impacting operational efficiencies.

“We’re uncovering things that were previously unseen. These include situations where the TOS has dispatched the task to the machine, but an issue with an operator had delayed implementation. We’ve now been able to address that issue, which would normally be unseen. With NextPort, the machine has spotted something unexpected and created an alert,” said Hein.

Using the insight, they have been able to educate the team to reduce operational inefficiencies. “It’s nice to talk about AI, which will happen of course, and this platform is the foundation for that, but at the same time we have started understanding and educating people by showing them their behaviors,” said Hein.

Meanwhile, John Alvarez, Research and Development Director, Fenix Marine Services, explained to delegates at the conference terminal complexity creates a monitoring challenge.

“We have a very typical commercial operation, utilizing up to 20 RTGs, 50 Top handlers and 150 UTR. We rely heavily on process automation. For this work, every single machine needs to send the information every single time, all the sensors need to be working, and how can you monitor that manually? It’s almost impossible. The only way to do that is to have this type of tool. With the real time monitor, it tells us if something is failing, so it’s very important.”

At the same time, he said they value the data that is being generated which enables insights into continuous improvement. “You cannot improve what you cannot measure, so the first thing we need to do is measure what we have and try to improve that. If you don’t have these tools it’s almost impossible.”

At CMA CGM, the company is already implementing NextPort in three terminals and looking to expand it into 10.

Francisco Blanquer, R&D Senior Manager, CMA CGM said: “We needed to create it into an industrial product for many terminals, so we needed something at we could copy and paste. We’re already in implementation in three terminals, but this year we’re going to start implementing it in ten. Scaling this up is the key for us.”

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At the heart of the new brand is the “N” monogram, representing the modeling and optimization of complex operational data in one intelligent system. It’s dynamic and purposeful—a symbol of movement, efficiency, and forward momentum. Paired with a custom-designed wordmark, the logo reflects our commitment to clarity, precision, and performance.

The refreshed identity is more than a visual change. It’s a signal of where we’re going and how we’re evolving to meet the real-world challenges of today’s terminals. Across every touchpoint, the new brand expresses who we are:

Innovative, expert, and focused on delivering results.

We’re not just updating how we look.

We’re reaffirming our mission: to turn operational complexity into clarity and to help our partners move confidently into the future.