There is a second story to it: about a decade ago, the shipyard owners realized that they had already reached the maximum ship size that they could transfer from the shipyard to the sea. So they announced that they would transfer the shipyard to the city of Eemshaven downstream the Ems river - a sensible decision you might think, however, Eemshaven is unfortunately already in the Netherlands. The state government, not wanting to lose a major employer in a rather poor area of the state, built a storm surge barrier to the tune of around 400 mio Euros, arguing it would be for flood prevention. Conveniently, it also allows blocking the outgoing tide, leaving the river at high tide for more than a couple of hours, allowing for larger ships to travel to the sea. At apparently quite an ecological cost.

Well, surprisingly the shipyard stayed in Lower Saxony. So much for European integration.

But it seems like they reached maximum ship size yet again, wondering what they are coming up with next.