More pressure on overall freight costs for the future

March 8, 2007 by SwizStick  
Filed under Seafreight, Supply Chain Management

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….as port costs are expected to rise:

Between new air-quality regulations, increasing fuel costs, a looming change in the port trucking industry and proposals for container fees, the cost of doing business in the port is going up.

But the questions of who pays and how much are still unclear.

Port authorities and lawmakers, backed by the public, have made it clear that terminal expansion and related growth will not be tolerated until port-generated air emissions are brought down.

The Clean Air Action Plan adopted by the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles in November set strict new air emission goals for terminal operators, ocean carriers, harbor craft, freight trucks and railroad operators.

The plan seeks to reduce port-generated emissions by nearly 50 percent within five years.

Cost estimates range from $2 to $4 billion to achieve those goals, and the public committed $1 billion to clean-air programs statewide with the passage of November’s $20-billion Proposition 1B.

The ports, meanwhile, have committed more than $200 million to help replace dirty diesel trucks, and the South Coast Air Quality Management District chipped in another $40 million for the effort.

Now, each link in the goods-movement chain is evaluating its share of the costs to the environmental effort through the purchase of new equipment, cleaner fuels and other ecological practices.

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