Green Shipping Line

[Video] Green Shipping Line Kit Assembly Line in Real Time Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line Watch Green Shipping Line’s kit assembly line in real time below. Video Player

California’s 20-cent Diesel Tax Hike Goes into Effect Press  / By  Green Shipping Line Truckers in California will now see increased prices at the pump after a 20-cent increase to the state’s diesel tax went into effect Wednesday, Nov. 1. The excise tax on diesel in the state jumped from 16 cents per gallon to 36 cents per gallon Wednesday. The state has also increased the sales tax rate on diesel from 9 percent to 13 percent. California Gov. Jerry Brown  signed a bill into law in April  that included the tax increases. The state expects to generate a combined $10.8 billion by increasing the diesel excise and state tax rates, along with $24.4 billion from a 12-cent gasoline tax increase that also went into effect Wednesday. The money generated by the taxes is to be used to fund transportation projects such as rebuilding roads and bridges. Six other states this year have increased fuel taxes , including Indiana, Montana, New Jersey, South Carolina, Tennessee, and...

Highway Trust Fund Ticker Press  / By  Green Shipping Line As the two graphs below indicate, both the Highway Account and the Mass Transit Account of the Highway Trust Fund are nearing insolvency. With the Highway Account expected to become insolvent by the end of the summer, the Department of Transportation may consider implementing cash management procedures to manage the flow of federal dollars. If the Department implements cash management procedures, reimbursements to states for infrastructure work will be limited to the available cash in the Trust Fund.  Additionally, the Department would distribute incoming funds in proportion to each state’s federal formula apportionment in the fiscal year. Highway Account Based on current spending and revenue trends, the U.S. Department of Transportation estimates that the Highway Account of the Highway Trust Fund will encounter a shortfall before the end of the fiscal year (FY) 2015. The Highway Account began FY 2015 with approxi...

WB I-94 Reopens After Tanker Fire, EB Lanes Still Closed Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line Westbound I-94 is back open after a tanker fire this morning shut down both sides of the expressway near the Dearborn/Detroit border. Eastbound lanes will remain closed from the Southfield Freeway to I-96 through the weekend, according to Diane Cross, a spokeswoman for the Michigan Department of Transportation. The tanker fire that ignited late this morning and involved two passenger vehicles and a semi left noticeable damage on the roadway, but no one was killed and officials said there were only minor injuries. But Cross said tonight that the damage was much worse than anticipated. Earlier in the day, she said at least 150 feet of the roadway would have to be removed, but that other damage, including smoke and soot on bridge support beams, is likely superficial. Fire officials from Dearborn also had to inspect the sewer system, which caught fire after fuel from the tanker leaked into it,...

Freight Volume Moving Through the U. S.’s Transportation Infrastructure Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line Freight Volume Moving Through the U. S.’s Transportation Infrastructure Access the pdf below for the current statistics on the volume of freight being transported via the U.S. Transportation Infrastructure. Estimates are  World Shipping Council  calculations based on source data from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration and Federal Highway Administration.   Download Now!

[Whitepaper] Two Ways To Revitalize U.S. Shipbuilding Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line Government incentives have jump-started new technologies and fostered the revitalization and retooling of entire U.S. industries. Recent examples include substantial Federal rebates for electric cars, credits for LEED-certified building systems, Renewable Energy Credits (REC) for Green Energy generation, loan guarantees for solar and wind turbines farms, the development of greener engines, and, most dramatically, Federal support for the auto industry and the Wall Street bank bail-outs. Billions of dollars of new investment capital have been attracted by government-supported start-ups and recapitalized industries whose products and services benefit society as a whole while sustaining and creating thousands of new jobs. Although Federal and State treasuries might defer taxes at the start of a program as an inducement to invest new capital into a venture, the payback from wage earners paying tax...

[Whitepaper] American Marine Highway: The Missing Transportation Mode Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line Today the United States has two well-recognized surface transportation modes—rail and road— and a third, which largely is forgotten. Missing is the marine mode, known as the American Marine Highway. Sometimes the simplest solutions are the hardest to see. Less than .003% of the U.S. Department of Transportation budget is proposed to be spent on the marine mode. A tiny fraction of that amount was allocated in FY 2010-2011 to starting up and supporting the American Marine Highway program and zero funding is budgeted for the program in FY 2012. Remarkably, America’s most underutilized and efficient transportation system asset is barely visible on the Federal funding screen. Download our whitepaper  to learn about how you can help further the re-utilization of the American Marine Highway as a sustainable and economical domestic transportation mode. Download Now!

[Whitepaper] US Commercial Shipbuilding: A Strategic National Asset Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line The U.S. is 97 percent reliant on foreign ships to transport its imports and exports. America’s standing as a commercial sea power has been in decline since the mid-twentieth century while China, Brazil and now India have declared that their commercial shipyards are “Strategic National assets”. “US-built coastal ships are the trucks of the US Marine Highway” The United States needs a fleet of modern coastal container and trailer ships and modern commercial shipyards that are up to the task. This new fleet is essential to the nation’s economic security and viability. It will be one element of a strategy to address the nation’s freight capacity requirements at a time of crisis in landside infrastructure funding. New ships will replace an aging, inefficient Jones Act container fleet at a time when strict, new environmental standards are enforced for the North American Emission...

Ambassador Bridge Reopened After Vehicle Fire Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line The Ambassador Bridge has been reopened following a vehicle fire that stopped traffic on the busy international crossing today. Ambassador Bridge spokesman Mickey Blashfield said traffic was restored after the fire, which was caused by a pickup hauling a trailer headed to Canada. He said what caused the vehicle fire is unknown. He said the Detroit Fire Department responded promptly to the fire. “Our guys did an outstanding job,” Detroit Fire Department Deputy Chief Jim Provost said. He said four engines, one ladder truck, one rescue squad, one hazmat response team, two battalion chiefs, and one deputy chief responded to the scene. He said the diesel fuel runoff was contained. The cause of the fire is undetermined, Provost said. (Photo: Bill Eisner) Source:  Detroit Free Press

Shippers Warn that Insufficient Infrastructure Could Create “Perfect Storm” Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line A lack of sufficient road and rail infrastructure, and insufficient port capacity will place stress on the global economy, creating the “perfect storm” for shipping according to the Global Shippers Forum (GSF). At the Eurocoke Summit in Amsterdam, Chris Welsh, secretary-general of the GSF, said:  “Increasing international trade will set unprecedented challenges to the transport system, particularly around ports, in port hinterland distribution and in the surface road and rail freight movements.” Welsh added: “The West Coast of the US has given a glimpse of a nightmare situation. The ‘perfect storm’ of larger container ships, new maritime alliance configurations, vessel bunching, port congestion, labor disputes, and a lack of inland haulage has placed unforeseen consequences on global supply chains and the US economy.” He continued: “West Coast port congest...

Effective Emergency Response Protects Communities in Western Maryland Train Incident Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line SWANTON, Md. (AP) —  CSX Corp. says it’s investigating the cause of a train derailment near the western Maryland community of Swanton. Spokesman Rob Doolittle says 11 of the 88 cars on a train traveling from Cumberland to Russell, Kentucky, derailed at about 4:30 a.m. Wednesday. He says no injuries or spills of hazardous materials were reported. Doolittle says eight of the derailed cars were empty. He says two contained fuel oil and one contained polypropylene. He says the train derailed near Spring Lick Road in a wooded area about two miles east of Swanton. The unincorporated community is near the eastern shore of Deep Creek Lake. CSX Corp. is based in Jacksonville, Florida. Source:  WBKO

Safe Transportation of Oil Secured through Effective Emergency Response in North Dakota Blog   / By   Green Shipping Line Less than a week after federal regulators announced strict new rules for the tank car trains that hauled more than 490,000 loads of oil last year. A train derailed and burst into flames Wednesday, forcing the evacuation of a North Dakota town. “The town of Heimdal is being evacuated,” said Sarah Feinberg, acting administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration. “Today’s incident is yet another reminder of why we issued a significant, comprehensive rule aimed at improving the safe transport of high-hazard flammable liquids.” At least six of the cars burst into flames. Nearby farms and Heimdal, a town of several dozen people, were evacuated. Feinberg dispatched a team of FRA investigators to the scene of the fifth major derailment of an oil train in North America this year. In two other cases in the United States, and one in Canada, a fire resulted. All o...

Highlighting the States with the Most Cost-Efficient Infrastructure Improvement Opportunities Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line The shoddy state of the nation’s roads costs the average driver $515 in extra operation and maintenance costs on their car, according to the latest analysis from TRIP, a national transportation research group. Meanwhile, the Highway Trust Fund is about to become insolvent, and congressional lawmakers can’t agree on a temporary fix that experts say is nothing more than a band-aid, and an inadequate one at that. The numbers from TRIP show that 28 percent of the nation’s major roadways — interstates, freeways, and major arterial roadways in urban areas — are in “poor” condition. This means they have so many major ruts, cracks, and potholes that they can’t simply be resurfaced — they need to be completely rebuilt. Those cracks and potholes put a lot of extra wear and tear on your car. They wear your tires away faster, and they decrease your gas mileage too....

Transportation for Our Country Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line Written by Pat Roche Today maritime trading is a worldwide network of commerce handling approximately 90% of the world’s non-bulk cargo. Most of the world has already returned to the roots of ocean trading by redeveloping “Short Sea Shipping” networks, which increase the speed of goods transported as well as alleviate road congestion. John Cabot, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Sir Walter Raleigh, and Christopher Columbus, are but a few names of early sailors on the east coast of the United States.  By the late 1570s, there had been a permanent colony established in Virginia.  This is where the beginnings of our maritime history really began.  Trading between the southern islands discovered by Christopher Columbus to the Labrador area discovered by John Cabot, and east to the Old World, trading by water for goods had begun; we have come a very long way since then. Today maritime trading is a worldwide network ...

Truckers Blog  / By  Green Shipping Line Written by Pat Roche Did you know that by utilizing a transportation infrastructure that combines trucks, trains, and ships we can take back the #1 spot in global commerce? With short sea shipping, we will be able to add efficiencies to the trucking companies that will add jobs and much-needed revenue to the truck companies allowing them to keep driver pay equivalent to their work. I know; the word alone brings up thoughts of trouble, lawlessness, and fear in many people.  Now, before proceeding, you need to know one thing, a TRUCK delivered everything you use in your daily life.  I stick by the line “Without trucks America stops”.  Now if I may, let me speak a bit about “truckers” and enlighten you a bit. There is a large misconception out in the general public about Truckers stemming from TV news programs to Hollywood and all the way to too many street corner conversations in between.  If you were to ask ...