TCU approval allows the MUC04 terminal lease to move forward in Fortaleza
The Federal Court of Accounts authorized the continuation of the MUC04 container terminal project at the Port of Fortaleza, but ordered adjustments to the feasibility study before the tender notice is published. The project provides for investments of approximately R$450 million and a focus on refrigerated cargo.
The Federal Court of Accounts (TCU) approved the framework for leasing the MUC04 container terminal at the Port of Fortaleza, in Ceará, on September 2, 2026. The decision allows the National Waterway Transport Agency (Antaq) to move forward with publishing the tender notice and setting the auction date, which will be the country’s first auction for container terminals in 2026.
Before this stage, however, Antaq and the Ministry of Ports and Airports must review the project’s Technical, Economic, and Environmental Feasibility Study. The points identified by the TCU include updating the conversion factor used to estimate the relationship between handled units and TEUs. The review may change the terminal’s cargo-handling projections.
The court’s technical analysis found that the loading and unloading system is MUC04’s main operational constraint. The subsystem’s estimated dynamic capacity is 360,000 TEUs, based on quay productivity parameters and a conversion factor reduced from 1.87 to 1.73 TEU per unit.
The government justified the change by revising the assumptions about the cargo profile expected during the contract, using the average observed at the Fortaleza/Pecém port complex as a reference. The TCU’s technical staff, however, pointed to the need to reassess the calculations before the tender notice is released.
The lease contract will run for 25 years and provides for investments of approximately R$450 million. The terminal is expected to serve deep-sea and cabotage operations, for both loading and unloading, as well as activities such as storage, inspection, scanning, repair, cleaning, and preparing containers for fumigation.
The facility will be geared toward refrigerated cargo, especially fruit destined for export. For this reason, the plan provides for at least 1,012 electrical outlets in the yard. The framework also estimates annual demand of 101,100 TEUs in 2028 and a dynamic operating capacity of 360,000 TEUs at the end of the concession, in 2051.