Pirate's Cove

Obviously, we all know that the supply chain issues are not just here in the U.S., but, world wide. Why are some so much worse than others? Let’s start here

Wilmington ports avoiding many supply chain issues affecting the US, small business still hurting

Ports around the world are seeing supply chain slowdowns, but that’s not the case in North Carolina. The ports in Wilmington are viewing the crisis elsewhere as an opportunity.

Throughout Friday, a steady flow of ships and trucks moved through the port of Wilmington without delays. The port authority says this could be a pivotal moment in taking business to the next level.

Wilmington is one of the biggest ports on the east coast. You also aren’t hearing about massive problems in Florida, Savannah, New York, and New Jersey. Yes, there are backups. Nothing like California, though, particularly Los Angeles and Long Beach, the biggest shipping ports on the west coast

This week, global supply chain issues reached a fever pitch, with the port of Los Angeles at one point facing a backup of more than 75 container ships waiting to offload their goods.

The CCO of North Carolina’s ports says disruptions to the supply chain in Asia are the cause.

“An exorbitant amount of the U.S. supply chain coming from Asia goes through LA/Long Beach. So in that respect it’s a disproportionate amount of cargo flow that’s going through the west coast,” said Bean.

Let’s head to California, for which The Last Refuge has done some interesting research

The California Version of The Green New Deal and an October 16, 2020, EPA Settlement With Transportation is What’s Creating The Container Shipping Backlog : Working CA Ports 24/7 Will Not Help, Here’s Why

Hundreds of requests for details on the specifics of the container shipping backlog.  So, I spent 3 days calling sources, digging for details and gathering information on the substantive issue at hand.  The epicenter of the problem is not what is being outlined by financial media, corporate media and politicians who have a specific interest in distracting from the issues at hand.  This has nothing to do with COVID-19.

The issues being discussed today relate to events that happened a long time ago.  As a matter of fact, it was so predictable that Amazon, Walmart, UPS, FedEx, Samsung, The Home Depot and Target all had taken actions years ago -long before COVID- because they knew this day would come.  It was not accidental that those companies showed up at the White House to discuss the issue, because there’s now a full court press to hide it.

The trucking issue with California LA ports, ie the Port of Los Angeles (POLA) and the Port of Long Beach (POLB), is that all semi tractors have to be current with new California emissions standards.  As a consequence, that mean trucks cannot be older than 3 years if they are to pick up or deliver containers at those ports.  This issue wipes out approximately half of the fleet trucks used to move containers in/out of the port.  Operating the port 24/7 will not cure the issue, because all it does is pile up more containers that sit idle as they await a limited number of trucks to pick them up.  THIS is the central issue.

On October 16, 2020, the EPA reached a settlement agreement [DATA HERE] with California Air Resource Board (CARB) to shut down semi tractor rigs that were non-compliant with new California emission standards:

I won’t say that COVID has nothing to do with this, but, what we see is that one big problem is the inability to have the trucks to deal with the sudden increase of goods after a big drop in goods. Why are so many East coast ports not having these problems? We don’t have the insane climate scam regulations, even in NY and NJ. The article even mentions that many compliant trucks pick up the goods then switch out when they leave California, letting the non-compliant trucks take them, then heading back for more.

In effect, what this 2020 determination and settlement created was an inability of half the nation’s truckers from picking up anything from the Port of LA or Port of Long Beach.  Virtually all private owner operator trucks and half of the fleet trucks that are used for moving containers across the nation were shut out.

It’s worth reading the whole article.