MURMANSK, March 10. /TASS/. The anchor project of the Murmansk Transport Hub, the Lavna port, located on the western shore of the Kola Bay in the Murmansk Region, will reach full capacity in 2026, the region's Ministry of Arctic Development and Economy told TASS.
"The Lavna port continues to build up its capacity: after a new stage was commissioned in January 2026, the port's capacity reached 12 million tons of coal a year, which is about 70% of the projected maximum. This year, the port's upgrade will continue, and Lavna will reach full capacity," the ministry said.
The interest in Murmansk as a container hub has been growing, and regional authorities are negotiating various transit flows. "Along with the cargo diversification, this creates a steady growth of traffic along the Northern Sea Route in the near future," the ministry added.
The first export consignment of coal from Lavna was in March 2025. The port is a key infrastructure facility in the Murmansk Region, an important Arctic transport hub with access to the Greater Northern Sea Route (a federal project to make a transport corridor stretching from Saint Petersburg and Kaliningrad to Vladivostok). In October, the State Transport Leasing Company's Director General Mikhail Parnev said the Lavna port could reach its project capacity of 18 million tons of coal in 2026, and in December, the Russian government approved the port would reach the project capacity by 2027.
The Lavna port is an anchor project of the Murmansk Transport Hub, which provides for creation of transport infrastructures on the Kola Bay's western shore, including coal and oil terminals, and railway infrastructures. The port will favor opening up new export routes to Asia-Pacific countries, including India. Lavna will also contribute to solving the strategic task of redirecting Russian export cargoes from Baltic ports to domestic ports.