April the 2nd, 2024 – A massive 180 million euro Gaženica investment in Zadar is on the horizon, the executor of which is retired Croatian general Ivan Čermak.
As Poslovni Dnevnik/Marija Brnic writes, Ivan Čermak has been doing business in Zadar for almost a decade now. Back in 2015, he leased an oil terminal in the Gaženica industrial zone from Tankerkomerc, which he eventually took over. He had big plans to invest in its modernisation and expansion, and also spread that to the Zadar Marina, one of the most attractive marinas in the entire Asdriatic managed by Tankerkomerc.
There was a multi-year dispute between the state and the Zadar-based company about this particular marina, which was ultimately won by the state. More recently, the Zadar Port Authority also officially entered into its possession, with the obligation to call for tenders for a new concessionaire within a period of one year.
Despite all these obstacles, the business with the oil terminal is continuing to develop, and, judging by the decisions made by the appropriate state bodies, it is becoming more and more “green”. At the end of last year, Čermak’s company Delta Terminali asked the Ministry of Economy and Sustainable Development to issue a permit for the security of the Oil Derivatives Terminal area, more precisely the renovation of the existing one, which is a legal obligation every five years for such a specific and sensitive activity.
Subsidies and lower risks
In the meantime, as can be read from the attached documentation, certain changes have taken place at the Delta oil products terminal. More precisely, the existing terminal for the storage of chemical products Kepol was repurposed and modernised for the storage of vegetable oils, namely palm oil.
That particular plant was out of order for a long time. In accordance with the new commitment to renewable energy sources and the subsidies that accompany such an orientation, as well as an increase in use, Delta Terminals managed to implement a conversion project at a warehouse with a capacity of 10 thousand cubic metres.
This change also reduced the potential danger to the environment and the safety of the terminal area in Gaženica, so it was also a plus in obtaining the approval of the Ministry of Economy for system security.
However, it seems that Delta Terminal’s intention to turn to biofuels, as an increasingly rapidly growing alternative to liquid fuels, isn’t going to merely stop there. Although General Čermak is a private individual and rarely speaks in public about his plans, he broke that pattern recently in Zadar. There, he spoke about his Gaženica investment plans, and the restoration of the Zadar-Knin railway line was also an important topic.
The Director of Investments and Development of the Delta Terminal, Svetlana Petrović, didn’t go into details, but she made it clear that several important investments of the company depend on this railway, and their total value stands at around 180 million euros. Judging by the available documentation on the s and expansion of the terminal’s storage areas, of which she is the author, the re-purposing of the terminal for biofuels is definitely in the works.
Biofuels, as Petrović pointed out, are one of the best developed and rapidly growing alternatives to liquid fuels on the market. As such, the investment cycles of Delta Terminali are based on projects aimed at expanding storage capacities that will follow the increase in biofuel consumption, the development of advanced biofuels and sustainable technologies.
a terminal with 29 employees
According to documentation from the Ministry of Economy, the total storage capacity of the Oil Terminal is 61,600 cubic metres. According to the announcements that have since appeared, the storage capacity should be increased to 105 thousand cubic metres.
From the documentation on terminal security, it is known that 29 employees are active in the terminal area. According to the latest available official data, in 2022, Čermak’s company employed an average of 40 of them, and they generated around 5 million euros in revenue. Another company, Delta Oil-International, which trades gasoline, diesel and other raw materials through the Zadar terminal, earned 199 million euros that year.
