Rhine River Water Levels Hit Record Low Since 1880, Disrupting European Shipping

By Eamon Akil Farhat, Rachel Graham and Sasha Draeger-Mazer

(Bloomberg) –Water levels on the Rhine river are dwindling further, with no relief in sight, forcing companies that rely on the waterway to adjust rapidly to keep goods flowing.

Levels at Kaub, Germany — the Rhine's shallowest point — have fallen to the lowest since records began in 1880, and could drop further as another heat wave bakes Europe this week. Forecasters say it would take weeks of sustained rain to lift the river toward more normal levels, meaning the crisis could drag on into October.

The Rhine is a key shipping route through Europe's industrial heartland, from Switzerland to Rotterdam, the continent's busiest port. The disruption along the waterway is throwing up supply chain challenges for companies ranging from steelmaker Thyssenkrupp AG to BASF SE and Lanxess AG.

"Shipments by ship are severely restricted, with vessels carrying significantly lighter loads than usual," specialty chemicals maker Lanxess said Tuesday in response to questions from Bloomberg. "As certain loading and unloading points are no longer accessible, we are switching to rail and road transport where possible. The situation is highly dynamic."

While the river never officially closes, some in the industry — including shipping broker Riverlake — are already warning that it has effectively become impassable at Kaub.

"Barges positioned on the Upper Rhine are unable to return to the ARA region," Riverlake said in a note Tuesday, referring to the Antwerp-Rotterdam-Amsterdam hub. "Barges from the ARA are unable to proceed further upstream."

A man sunbathes on the exposed riverbed on the Rhine near Kaub. Photographer: Alex Kraus/Bloomberg

The disruption puts at risk supplies of commodities that are typically carried along the waterway, ranging from diesel, heating oil and coal to grains and cocoa. German utility EnBW normally relies on shipments of coal which arrive from Rotterdam, while Germany's Miro oil refinery exports gasoline on barges. EnBW on Friday estimated that the disruption on the Rhine will reduce its earnings by a low double-digit-million-euro figure.

"The Rhine's low water levels are restricting inland shipping capacities and posing major challenges for logistics and supply chains," chemicals firm Evonik Industries AG said Tuesday. The company is reacting "with extensive precautionary measures and is shifting a part of its freight transport to rail and road."

Like Evonik, BASF reported isolated bottlenecks, but said it's been able to keep shipping along the river by deploying more vessels designed for low-water conditions. When necessary, it's using land transportation.

Germany's Inland Waterway Transport Cooperative maintains that barges can still pass at Kaub, with vessels able to get through even when the clearance level drops to around 10 centimeters, or about four inches. It's currently at 14 cm at Kaub.

Whether a barge can navigate in such low water can depend on how many propellers it has, and how heavily laden it is with goods. Water levels at Kaub have been dropping for months, with one barge owner already idling vessels as of late July.

The clearance level doesn't represent the actual depth of the navigation channel, but serves as a reference point for vessels. Based on German federal waterways calculations, a gauge reading of 14 cm corresponds to a navigable fairway depth of about 1.27 meters. Forecasts from the Federal Waterways and Shipping Administration show the level could fall to 9 cm by Friday.

Sparse rainfall and unrelenting heat have strangled the basin that feeds the Rhine, which has also been depleted by reduced runoff from Alpine snow and glaciers, said David Hannah, a professor of hydrology at the University of Birmingham in England.

While cooler temperatures are forecast for next week, with a chance of rain in Germany, any respite for the river may be short lived as weather models show a quick return to drier conditions, according to Don Keeney, lead forecaster at Vaisala.

To help alleviate transport bottlenecks, the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein on Tuesday joined other regional governments in temporarily lifting a ban on trucking on Sundays and public holidays. "To keep the logistics chains necessary for supplying the public and the economy reasonably stable, they must be shifted — at least in part — to road transport," the state's economy ministry said.

Still, trucking can only help so much. Covestro AG, a German maker of polymers and high performance plastics, said its takes 60 trucks to replace a single barge with a load capacity of 1,500 metric tonnes. The situation is now affecting its raw material supplies and production at individual sites, it said, as well as the delivery of certain products.

Europe is bracing for its fifth heat wave of the summer, with unusually high temperatures expected in France, Germany and Poland. Temperatures are forecast to peak toward the end of the week and over the weekend. Drought conditions have worsened across the region, data from the European Commission show.

"A noticeable rise in water levels is unlikely before October," Ralph Solveen, senior economist at Commerzbank, wrote in a note. If the water remains at a critically low level through mid-September, that would shave about 0.35 percentage point from Germany's gross domestic product this quarter, he estimated.

The Danube has been battling with similar extreme conditions and saw some respite when a rebound in the river's level from record lows allowed Hungary to slightly increase electricity production at its Paks nuclear plant on Monday.

However, Prime Minister Peter Magyar warned that there were no signs yet that the drought situation will improve in coming days and engineers were ready to again wind down the functioning turbines at the nuclear plant if needed.

Emergency services have been battling fires across Hungary as months without significant rain have left the vegetation bone dry, though most of the blazes are contained for now.

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