TEESPORT owner PD Ports said it had seen a record year with 55.8m tonnes of cargo going through its ports last year.

The Middlesbrough company increased volumes by almost two million tonnes on top of 2004's figures.

More than 64 per cent of the volume was outbound and export traffic.

Volumes were buoyed by almost one million tonnes of project cargo being handled through Hartlepool for the construction of a new pipeline in the North Sea.

Extra steel being shipped out for steelmaker Corus' Teesside operations also boosted the figures by half a million tonnes.

PD Ports said the cargo for the chemical industry remained broadly static for the full year, but there were increases in November and December.

Downturns in car imports were offset by a "significant" increase in deep sea container traffic, boosting PD Ports' hopes of building a £300m deep sea container terminal on the Tees.

Major global shipping lines MSC and Maersk started direct calls to Teesport in the year.

Managing director David Robinson said: "These are excellent results. We have had a number of unusual benefits in 2005, which have helped generate a record year."

PD Ports, which employs 1,500 people, was recently the subject of a takeover battle and only last week confirmed it had been fully taken over by Australian infrastructure firm Babcock & Brown