In the project »In Between«, Henirk Spohler/laif explores our civilisation’s incredible consumption of energy, raw materials and the movement of materials. This will be shown using the harbour of Rotterdam as an example. Oil reserves are stored there next to coal and ore dumps, mountains of containers with new technical goods from Korea are unloaded – and one quay further on, the legacies of our consumption are waiting to be shipped to China as piles of scrap metal. The magazine NZZ-Geschichte looks at the importance of sea cargo transport for globalisation.