The Maritime Minute
News from The American Maritime Partnership, December 20, 2011
JONES ACT CARRIERS MAKE IT EASIER TO BE GREEN IN ALASKA: South Central Alaska is far from many of the closest recycling centers located in Washington’s Puget Sound. However, the two main U.S.-flag carriers in the Anchorage-Tacoma trade – Totem Ocean Trailer Express (TOTE) and Horizon Lines ? have partnered with Alaskans for Litter Prevention & Recycling (ALPAR) to make the choice and cost of recycling easier for Alaskans. The two Jones Act carriers donate the trailers and provide ocean-borne transit to get much of Alaska’s recycled aluminum and steel cans and multiple grades of plastics, paper and cardboard to markets in and around Tacoma and Seattle. This amounts to nearly a thousand 40-FE’s (forty-foot equivalent) containers each year. ALPAR Executive Director Mary Fisher stressed that, “The generous contributions by the marine carriers to move recyclables to Seattle play a huge role in making recycling economically viable for our communities. Without these contributions, recycling would be significantly stymied throughout the state.”
BUSY WINTER AT WISCONSIN SHIPYARD: Nearly 800 men and women will be hard at work this winter at Bay Shipbuilding Company in Sturgeon Bay, Wis. The construction of two platform supply vessels, coupled with the normal maintenance and modernization of U.S.-flag Great Lakes freighters (lakers), will keep the yard at full employment for the next several months. The platform supply vessels are the first Bay Ship has built. However, the yard�s experience in building freighters that can keep going in the thick ice that forms on the Great Lakes each winter was crucial, as energy exploration is moving into northern regions of the world. Click here to read more.
LAKES FLEET GROWING AGAIN: The Great Lakes’ Jones Act fleet will welcome a new member next spring. Rand Logistics, Inc., has acquired the articulated tug/barge unit BEVERLY ANDERSON/MARY TURNER, which has been working in the Gulf of Mexico. The vessel will sail to the Lakes in the spring and have new self-unloading gear installed before entering the dry-bulk trades. The vessel will be operated by Grand River Navigation Company of Avon Lake, Ohio.
FOSS MARITIME TO BUILD NEW FERRY IN WASHINGTON: The state of Washington has ordered a new car ferry to move residents, school children and emergency responders across Lake Roosevelt. Foss Maritime of Seattle won the $9.6 million contract. Given the lake’s remote location, the 20-car ferry will have to be built in sections and transported across the state for final assembly near the ferry landing. The ferry is expected to enter service in May 2013.