Kaub gauge falls to 11 centimetres

The Kaub gauge on the Middle Rhine read 11 centimetres on Wednesday (ELWIS, Reuters). The previous record low, set in 2018, was 25 cm. Kaub is the shallowest stretch on the Middle Rhine. It controls through-traffic between the North Sea ports and Germany's industrial core, which means barges heading for chemical plants, steelworks and refineries must all squeeze past this single point. As of this week, through traffic has largely stopped.

As we reported earlier (To Brief), the disruption was already squeezing production. It has since moved from expensive to mostly unusable for cargo.

Barges can float but cannot carry

The gauge does not measure the river's depth. It reads water against a fixed reference mark. When Kaub showed 16 cm last week, the actual navigable channel still held about 129 cm of water (Tagesschau, Zevener Zeitung). But below 40 cm on the gauge, operators say trips stop making commercial sense because vessels must sail nearly empty. There is no formal sailing ban; captains decide whether to proceed (RTL/AFP). Most choose not to.

One shipowner told Argus Media that a 1,200-tonne vessel was loaded with just 180 tonnes and needed five days instead of two from the Rotterdam area to Karlsruhe (Argus). Contargo, Germany's largest inland container operator, suspended regular services to the southern Rhine and Rhine-Main region entirely (Arab News/Reuters).

Freight rates from Rotterdam to Karlsruhe surged from roughly €45 per tonne in June to €155–160, with petroleum loads hitting €200 (France24, Mercopress). That is no longer a marginal transport surcharge. For low-margin cargo like construction aggregate or animal feed, it changes whether the shipment moves at all.

300 million tonnes with no easy substitute

The Rhine carries roughly 300 million tonnes a year: petroleum products, chemicals, iron ore, coal, grain, construction materials (S&P Global, CCNR). One 1,500-tonne barge replaces about 60 trucks (C&EN). BASF moves 75% of its European raw materials by water to its Ludwigshafen site, an integrated complex where one plant's missing input can halt downstream production. The company told customers it could not guarantee delivery of some surfactants after low water cut off raw-material supply (Insurance Journal).

Transport Minister Steffen Bilger convened a crisis summit and announced Sunday truck-ban exemptions, faster road permits and postponed lock maintenance (Zeit). At least eight German states have eased weekend trucking rules (DW). The gap between the fix and the problem is enormous: industry estimates put the missing capacity at 50–75%, with up to 6 million tonnes a month stranded, roughly 250,000 truckloads (trans.info). EU driving-time rules still apply, so truckers allowed to work on Sunday must rest later in the week. The exemptions redistribute operating hours. They do not create drivers, trucks or road space.

The same drought hits neighbouring stretches of the corridor. Strasbourg port now receives about three barges a day instead of 20. A grain silo there reported 70% of its cereals normally leave by water; the grain sits in storage (TF1). Germany and the Netherlands together handle over 70% of EU inland waterway freight (Eurostat). When this corridor breaks, costs rise for every manufacturer whose supply chain touches it.

The winners are narrow and temporary: operators with scarce shallow-draft vessels, and truckers picking up spot work. The losers are broader, from chemical plants and fuel distributors to grain handlers whose business models depend on predictable barge transport. Kiel Institute economist Stefan Kooths estimated the low water could shave 0.1–0.2 percentage points off German economic output in the third quarter (Tagesschau, DW). Small nationally, but concentrated heavily in specific supply chains. Every workaround, Sunday trucks, lighter barges, emergency rail slots, reallocates scarce capacity. None of them creates water.