Port of Dover’s innovative plans to ensure it continues to be the ‘port of choice’

Doug

Bannister, CEO of Port of Dover, talks to Sarah Dale about their ambition to continuously improve and how AI is helping to ensure smoother and quicker transitions through the UK’s busiest dock.

The Port of Dover is the busiest international ferry port in the UK, handling more lorries than all other UK ports, two million freight vehicles and around 10 million passengers a year.

It carries £144bn of trade, and a third of the UK’s trade in goods with the European Union..

“It is a very busy travel hub,” says Doug Bannister, CEO of the Port of Dover since 2019.

“The reason why the market and the people choose Dover is its unrivalled geographic position and proficiency and frequency of sailings, as well as being an optimum product to get to Europe from the UK, and that is timeless.

“It would be very easy for us to sit back and just count the vehicles going through, but we are looking to continuously improve. We are leveraging our leadership, technology improvements and sustainability goals to ensure that we continue to be the port of choice.”

Originally from New Jersey, Doug’s career in shipping has enabled him to live all over the world from the Netherlands to Australia, the US to the UK and he took the helm of the Port of Dover just ahead of one of the most difficult periods in recent history – Brexit and the Covid pandemic.

“It’s been one heck of a ride,” says Doug. “It’s thrown up a whole range of challenges.”

Last year, the Port, which has a long association with the Kent Invicta Chamber, completed its Port of Dover 2050 masterplan, a long-term plan to realise its vision to be “the UK’s most seamless, sustainable and tech enabled port”.

The plan, which was developed through strong engagement with stakeholders including customers, employees, port users and the Government, is to unlock the full potential of the Port, facilitating a 20 per cent increase in the value of trade handled to £173 billion (at 2023 prices) and creating new jobs. The Port currently employs 450 people with another couple of thousand working as contractors.

“Back in March 2022, we set out our sustainability goal of being net zero for 2025 – five years faster than any other port of the UK, so we are industry leading,” adds Doug.

Since 2007, the Port has reduced its carbon emissions by 98 per cent through an active programme of measures including solar energy panels, LED lighting, and using HVO (hydrogenated vegetable oil) fuel for the fleet.

“We hit our target last year,” says Doug. “There is some gas in the older buildings, but we have active programmes to minimise that as part of our sustainability agenda. By 2030, scope 3 of our plan is looking at our supply chains. Beyond 2030, we want to have established ourselves as the world’s first high volume green shipping corridor.”

In March 2023, they signed a memorandum of understanding with their sister ports in Calais and Dunkirk to make their fleet of ferries fully electric.

One of the most revolutionary parts of the Port’s improvement plans is using Artificial Intelligence (AI). Eighteen months ago, they started a pilot trial using AI to predict traffic volume.

“One of the most exciting things we are looking at is AI,” he says.

“It predicts within 15-minute windows of arrival of vehicles and trucks, cars, coaches – and it is eerily accurate.

“Last August, which is a very busy time particularly for cars during the summer holiday period, its predictions were 98.08 per cent accurate. And it predicted a spike of truck arrivals in December, which we thought was a glitch, because there were no roadworks, no events, ships were sailing okay, and there were no issues in France, but then at 11am on 12 December we had a spike in arrivals just as the AI software had predicted.

“We are using it more for both tactical and medium-term planning. It allows for better resource balancing and means that you can work confidently to move resources around the port to meet demand. It’s proving time and time again just how useful such tech will be. And ultimately what that leads to is smoother transit for everyone going through the port and crucially keeping it smooth.”

As part of its plans, the Port is working with Dover District and Town Councils to make Dover more widely an attractive place to invest in as well as improving the town for residents.

Being a Kent Invicta Chamber member is also integral to keep abreast of the issues that matter to the people of Kent.

“Kent Invicta is a very active Chamber and they pull things from a national level to a local level,” he adds.

It has been a stormy time for the economy in recent years from Brexit to the Covid pandemic and the Port has endured several challenges.

“Brexit has created a lot of challenges for us,” he says.

“Operating in a post-Brexit environment, which is so reliant on borders running smoothly, presented a challenge. We have needed to invest in infrastructure and come up with new processes to handle that return of demand in a post-Brexit environment. Since the pandemic, we have now seen a return in our travel trade.”

Doug says the new Government’s ambitions have been “really advantageous” for the Port and the nation.

“We’re aligned with the Government’s ambition to create opportunities for people and reward our hardworking people, but the most recent changes are creating headwind,” he says.

“We must consider the cost of the excellent people that we have working down here. Port of Dover is a Living Wage employer, but we have got to think more about NI and other challenges that they’re proposing.

“One of the things that business likes is certainty. As long as you know what the rules of the game are you can play even if you don’t like it. Not knowing creates uncertainty, and there is a lot of high uncertainty around the world right now.

“The EU is the UK’s largest trading partner and has been throughout history. Through the very good work that our Government is doing in creating improvements, that’s going to allow us up and down the nation to have some certainty on where we may find opportunities for export and investment.”

Doug says they are continuously innovating to improve people’s experience of ferry travel.

“One of the expectations people have of travelling by ferry is they expect to get straight on, but at airports, you have to arrive two hours early, check in luggage, go through security and passport control, transfers etc, so it can take up to five or six hours on top of flight time, but wait times at the Port are much quicker.

“Last summer, through the improvements we made using AI and infrastructure we took our average from 43 minutes to 10 minutes, a marked improvement. Throughout the summer, Dover was also congestion free, but we are continuously looking at ways to improve.

“One of the things we piloted this Easter was a new regime for UK and French school groups to prioritise school coaches, reducing the time to 10 minutes for each coach using that scheme, and we will continue to build on that in the summer. It’s a good example of how we work with our partners.

“It would be very easy to sit back and watch the traffic go through, but we are constantly looking at ways to improve.”

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