OR, Portland

May 4, 19:08 New hybrid vessel may help revive Portland Maine Port Authority officials say...

seagull May 4, 19:08
New hybrid vessel may help revive Portland

Maine Port Authority officials say the development of an innovative new hybrid vessel, cheaper than large freighters but more versatile than barges, could be the key to restoring container cargo service in the state's largest port, reported Bangor Daily News.

US Representative Chellie Pingree is bringing the country's top maritime official to Portland's International Marine Terminal, three days after New York-based American Feeder Lines announced it is discontinuing its container shipping service that tied Portland to Halifax.

The Maine Port Authority leases the terminal from the city of Portland. The loss of container service has dealt a blow to the agency's efforts to convince Maine importers and exporters that they can count on the port as a way to move products and materials around the world.

Further, the authority is in the midst of major capital upgrades at the terminal and agency leaders must revive shipping service at the site in order for the overhaul to be justified. In fiscal year 2011, the terminal ran at a loss of nearly $464,000.

But Pingree and Maine Port Authority executive director John Henshaw say they believe there are opportunities to rebuild container shipping in Portland. Among them is the proposed development of an Articulated Tug Barge adapted to handle shipping containers.

The tug boat-barge hybrid already is used in the petroleum trade, but would need a series of design modifications to allow it to carry the 40-foot-long rectangular steel shipping containers importers and exporters are accustomed to using.

Henshaw told the Bangor Daily News on Thursday such a vessel has been preliminarily designed under a joint venture by the US Maritime Administration and Defence Department, and Pingree hopes to convince federal Maritime Administrator David Matsuda that it's worth an additional allocation of about $350,000 to finish the designs.

"One thing that is going to make it easier to develop service to ports like Portland is a more efficient ship design that can be built in local yards at a low cost to make short-sea shipping more economical," Pingree said in a statement. "I'd like to see the Maritime Administration make the design of that ship a reality. It could go a long way to getting that service up and running again."

The hybrid ships would cost between $30 million and $50 million to construct, compared to the $70 million to $125 million price tag associated with large container ships. Henshaw said such vessels could be built by Washburn & Doughty Associates of East Boothbay, as the shipyard has experience with previous versions of the Articulated Tug Barges.

Henshaw said the US Department of Transportation has approved a Maine Port Authority project to develop a coastal shipping route from Portland to the port of New York, and the new barges would be key to breathing life into the channel.

en.portnews.ru

May 3, 16:47 Portland loses another container service The port of Portland has lost schedu...

seagull May 3, 16:47
Portland loses another container service

The port of Portland has lost scheduled container shipping again, nine months after the start of weekly service connecting Boston and Halifax, Nova Scotia, reported Portland Press Herald.
Containers await transport at the International Marine Terminal in Portland today.

New York-based American Feeder Lines announced that it has suspended operations, citing a lack of volume and loss of private investment. The company is closing down.

"We're very disappointed, we thought the timing was right," Rudy Mack, the company's chief operating officer, told The Portland Press Herald.

The move is a blow to Portland, which is in the midst of rebuilding and expanding cargo facilities at the International Marine Terminal. The US$5 million, federally funded project will be done this summer.

American Feeder Line's demise also represents a financial loss for the Maine Port Authority. In early March, the authority approved a $200,000 loan to the company to help pay for operations.The money came from lease and dockage revenues, not tax dollars. Boston and Halifax made similar loans.
That investment now appears to be gone.

It's possible that another operator will step in to resume the service from Halifax, an important market connection to New England. The port of Portland is being used by several Maine shippers.

White Rock Distilleries in Lewiston, L L Bean in Freeport, Schnitzer Steel Industries in Auburn and a half-dozen paper mills, including Sappi's Westbrook and Somerset facilities, have been either importing or exporting goods overseas through Portland and Halifax.

"There's a lot of interest," said John Henshaw, executive director of the Maine Port Authority. "This is a lost opportunity, but it's not the last opportunity."

The port of Portland has long had a strong commercial link to Halifax, which is home to several major shipping lines. But the port lost weekly container service to Halifax in 2008, when another company pulled out. A barge that took pulp to New York stopped calling in 2009.

The arrival of American Feeder Lines was a hopeful sign that Portland could again have stable and reliable freight service for business and industry. It also supported up to 20 longshoreman positions, for unloading cargo and operating the marine terminal.

Boston, Portland and Halifax were the first leg of a new venture meant to link a string of Altantic ports, from Miami to Portland.
American Feeder Lines had set up a hub-and-spoke network, in which imported cargo from large container vessels was shuttled to smaller ports, such as Portland, on a fleet of feeder ships.

For exports, the smaller ships fed the big vessels. This so-called short-sea container service is a common way to move freight in other countries, but not in the United States, where it faces strong competition from trucks and railroads.

American Feeder Lines had hoped it could buck that trend. It ultimately wanted to build a fleet of environmentally-friendly container ships that would take freight traffic off crowded East Coast highways.

The company began operations last summer with a chartered vessel, the AFL New England. Mack said today that he and his partners put roughly $3 million into the venture, and received $2 million from investors. But the service wasn't generating enough cash flow to continue, according to Mack. It also was hurt by diesel prices that soared this year to record levels.

"Volume grew every month, but at a very slow pace," he said.
Henshaw noted that the service was starting from scratch again in Portland and it took time to sign up shippers.

"To my mind, it took longer than investors thought it would, but it was moving in the right direction," he said.

Maine shippers were still waiting today to get official word about the future of the service. Harold Jones, traffic manager for White Rock Distilleries, has been importing tanks of grain alcohol from France through Halifax to Portland. It was more convenient and less costly to truck the alcohol from Portland than Boston, where it had been shipped prior to the new service.

"We're very sorry to see the service suspended and hope it can resume," he said. "I'm not giving up on the port."

If another operator doesn't come forward, Jones said he'll go back to Boston.

en.portnews.ru

Aug 31, 8:05 Portland Terminal begins upgrade to help exports Work will begin this week on a...

seagull Aug 31, 8:05
Portland Terminal begins upgrade to help exports
Work will begin this week on a $5 million upgrade at the International Marine Terminal in Portland, where operators say a pier expansion and improved container yard will help sustain recently rebooted container shipping at the site, Worldmaritimenews reports.

Executive Director John Henshaw of the Maine Port Authority said he’s busy visiting with companies in the state to convince them of the benefits of shipping through the terminal. Start-up shipper American Feeder Lines restarted large container shipping service to Portland last month, more than three and a half years since the Icelandic company Eimskip stopped calling on the city in late 2007.

While the previous 17 years of large container shipping service at the site proved there’s potential for that type of business on the waterfront, Henshaw acknowledged that capital investments like those beginning this week are necessary to prove to wary companies that the service is here to stay.

Large containers are 20- to 40-foot steel rectangular boxes carrying everything from raw materials to finished products for import and export.

“We knew there was freight that wanted to move between here and beyond Halifax,” Henshaw said, referencing the Canadian shipping hub through which American Feeder Lines moves its containers to an international market. “But obviously you’ve got to build some confidence that you’re here for the long haul. A company isn’t going to change their entire supply chain just because this new service popped up.”

The Maine Port Authority has leased the terminal from the city of Portland and operated it since 2009.

With $5 million in federal Department of Transportation grant money, the authority’s contractors this week will begin about a year of work expanding the pier by 5,000 square feet, demolishing at least two buildings and leveling the ground from the pier to Commercial Street.

The result will be a landscape upon which more, larger containers can be moved onto and off of ships and located in a place where they can be easily accessed by road by Maine companies using them.

Currently, four platforms that can hold 450 pounds per square foot connect the terminal yard with the pier, limiting the size and quantity of what can be loaded and unloaded from ships calling on Portland, the only American container shipping yard north of Boston. During the gap in service from late 2007 to mid-2011, companies that previously shipped through the terminal turned to train or truck to move their products and materials, Henshaw said.

The new pier expansion will create a single, wider connection to the terminal yard, with the strength to hold 1,000 pounds per square foot.

“We’ve actually had manufacturers’ representatives come in here and say, ‘We can’t get certain components in here,’ or, ‘We can, but we’ll need specialized equipment, and that’ll make [using this terminal] prohibitively expensive,’” Henshaw said.

With the extra space and weight, terminal workers will be able to not only handle heavier shipments but will be able to organize containers for easy loading onto the ship, which currently calls on Portland once a week.

“It’ll be a benefit,” said Jack Humeniuk, a local representative of the International Longshoremen’s Association, the labor union representing workers at the site. “It’ll make things more functional and more productive.”

Humeniuk said the work force at the terminal maintained steady numbers even during the gap in container shipping service there, as the site continued to be home to limited tug and tow barge operations. But he acknowledged that if the upcoming improvements trigger a boom in business, more jobs could be the result.

“We’re hoping we’re going to add more longshoremen because of an increase in business here,” said Henshaw. “Ultimately, I’d like to see 100 containers going in and 100 containers going out every week. We’re not quite there yet.”

He estimated the terminal currently sees between 30 and 50 containers moving through it each week. Construction work is slated to be finished by Aug. 30, 2012, and Henshaw said it will be orchestrated in such a way that does not interfere with regular operations there.

“The bigger picture is to allow a lot more Maine companies that participate in world markets to import and export more efficiently,” Humeniuk said. “That’s the higher benefit of investing in transportation infrastructure like this.”

seanews.ru/event

Sep 1 '10, 11:40 Regulators re-evaluating dredge spoil dumping on West Hayden Island The Orego...

seagull Sep 1 '10, 11:40
Regulators re-evaluating dredge spoil dumping on West Hayden Island

The Oregonian reports that the city of Portland and Oregon's Department of Environmental Quality are re-evaluating whether dredge spoils with low levels of contamination should be dumped on West Hayden Island after island activists and environmental groups raised concerns about the proposal.

The Port of Portland wants to put 75,000 cubic yards of material dredged to improve navigation over the Willamette River's Post Office Bar onto the undeveloped western portion of the island, whose northern flank has long been used as a dumping site.

But Willamette Riverkeeper, the Audubon Society of Portland and others objected at a DEQ hearing on a draft permit earlier this week, noting the spoils contain low levels of hydrocarbons and DDT, the now-banned pesticide.

On August 4th city planners signed a land-use compatibility form that DEQ required before approving the project. Planner Phil Nameny said Tuesday that the form appears to cover only the dredging in the Willamette, not dumping on the Columbia River island. He said the city is researching whether the dumping also requires city approval.

DEQ officials said they assumed the city's endorsement included the dumping site. That was key to concluding - as required by state regulations - that depositing the dredge spoils would qualify as a "beneficial use," in this case serving as fill for future industrial development, said Jim Anderson, DEQ's Portland Harbor cleanup manager.

The DEQ also wants to do more research on how much of the island is in the 100-year flood plain, important because a flood could send contaminated soil into the Columbia River. Opponents' concerns about the potential for contaminants to seep into groundwater also need more evaluation, agency officials said.

businesstimes.com.sg

Aug 16 '10, 9:49 Port of Portland signs terminal lease with ICTSI The Port of Portland closed ...

seagull Aug 16 '10, 9:49
Port of Portland signs terminal lease with ICTSI

The Port of Portland closed on a 25-year lease of its container and breakbulk facilities at Terminal 6 to ICTSI Oregon, a subsidiary of International Container Terminal Services Inc.
ICTSI Oregon will pay the port $8 million, in addition to an annual rent payment of $4.5 million, subject to any increases in the consumer price index. As cargo volumes increase, ICTSI Oregon will pay additional incremental revenue per container moved.

Aug 9 '10, 10:34 Conservation groups question Port of Portland's disposal policy for dredged mate...

seagull Aug 9 '10, 10:34
Conservation groups question Port of Portland's disposal policy for dredged material.

opb.org reports that conservation groups are raising new questions this week about a recent dredge-and-dump operation involving an environmentally sensitive part of North Portland.

Portland Audubon and Willamette Riverkeeper say the Port of Portland dumped contaminated dredge material on West Hayden Island, making the site only suitable for industrial uses - like the ones the port is hoping to get approved.

The port says it did recently dump more than 20,000 tons of material from the Portland harbor at West Hayden Island. But port officials argue it isn’t very different from what has been dumped before. Audubon conservation director, Bob Sallinger, disagrees.

Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality says the Port got a new kind of permit to do the dumping. The permit allows dumping material that would otherwise go to a landfill.

It allows dumping if there is 'beneficial use' - such as fill for an industrial site. That’s the kind of site the Port plans to create for West Hayden Island, to expand its shipping capacity.

But the port argues the site could be cleaned up, if plans change.