In September, Illinois-based Mi-Jack launched a US- made RTG on the market. Different from the company’s well-known low-height intermodal RTGs, its new JL1400P machine is designed for standard RTG applications at ports and intermodal terminals. It competes with RTGs from Konecranes, Liebherr, ZPMC and others.

The machine comes on the market at the same time as a significant amount of grant funding is available to ports and railroads under the Biden Administration’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. This funding comes with ‘Buy America’ conditions that require that ‘all of the iron, steel, manufactured products and construction materials used in the project are produced in the US’. For a manufactured product to meet the test, 60% of the total cost of the components must be manufactured in the US, with further increases to 65% in 2024, and 75% in 2029.

More to follow?

Mi-Jack’s move obviously changes the landscape with regard to exemptions from Buy America requirements in any grant funding that could be used to purchase RTGs. Mi-Jack has a US supply chain for its domestically made products, which includes a large number of components as well as fabrication of the main steel structures and trolley.

At the same time, the large number of yard cranes being ordered by ports and intermodal terminals has increased the size of the US market considerably recently. These factors may lead other equipment OEMs to start thinking about US fabrication and/or increasing the US-made content of their products.

Despite the opportunity, at this stage the indications are that US fabrication is a difficult road to go down for non-US OEMs. Buy America provisions led to some of the Konecranes widespan RMGs at Savannah being fabricated in the US by Hammer Haag Steel in Florida. The first machines were fabricated in the US, but Konecranes switched back to its regular supply chain to complete the project, and as far as is known, it does not plan to fabricate RTGs in the US.

Why not?

Crane and structural engineering consultants Casper Phil- lips & Associates (CP&A) were commissioned by the Georgia Port Authority for the design and specification review of its widespan RMG procurement. In an interview, Richard Phillips, crane engineer and port machinery consultant at CP&A, said that there are crane manufacturers, shipyards and steel fabricators in the US that could produce steel sections for container cranes, if not complete machines, but these companies are not set up to produce container cranes and have grown their businesses into different markets.

Phillips stressed that it is a misconception that US suppliers are not capable of building large steel sections and high-capacity cranes, including STS cranes. CP&A works with companies producing cranes for the aerospace, nuclear and industrial sectors, as well as fabricators producing large steel sections for bridges and other infrastructure.

These products have a lot of similarities with container cranes, but are designed in the US for a US supply chain, using domestic materials produced to imperial measurements and US specifications.

The container crane industry, by contrast, is a different market, where the products use materials produced to metric sizes and predominantly European standards. Furthermore, while there are specifications in the US for underhung bridge cranes, nuclear cranes and other products, there is no equivalent for container cranes. It is more difficult, therefore, for manufacturers to produce a standard product as each customer comes with its own specifications and requirements.

On the supply side, US infrastructure grant funding is also available in the highway, bridge, rail and public transit sectors. Many of the companies that could do so, “just don’t need to make container cranes” at the moment, Phillips observed, as they are busy elsewhere.

That could change, but for US fabricated cranes to really be a viable option, container crane OEMs need to partner with US companies in a way that is mutually beneficial. Phillips noted that there is a learning curve to setting up a steel shop to fabricate crane sections, plus investment required in building jigs and sometimes lifting equipment to handle the large steel sections. The investment cost is significant, and US firms need to see that there is an ongoing return. Typically, this would come from a partnership that includes a wider range of products than just one or two crane types, and includes the service and spare parts business that provides ongoing revenue. There is a path, but it is not yet clear whether the Buy America provisions will be enough to push the market in this direction.

Getting a Buy America exemption

A recent case involving the use of Department of Transportation (DOT) funding for a mobile harbour crane (MHC) at the International Marine Terminal at the Port of Portland in Maine highlights how a waiver to the ‘Buy America’ rules is getting harder to obtain.

In 2016, the Port of Portland was awarded US$2.2M from the FASTLANE Programme towards the US$4.5M cost of an MHC. In 2017, the Maine DOT ran a tender for the crane and submitted a Buy America Waiver request for a Liebherr MHC. The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) initially published a notice of its intention to issue a waiver in early 2017. However, then President Donald Trump then issued an Executive Order requiring every executive branch agency to monitor, enforce and comply with existing ‘Buy American Laws’ and minimise the use of waivers.

In response the Maine DOT, FHWA and MARAD developed a new RFP for the MHC seeking either a fully compliant crane or one that could maximise the US content by using ‘greater’ quantities of US steel. Recognising that it was likely a waiver would still be required, it asked suppliers to “maximise the use of domestic content to justify a Buy America waiver”.

Liebherr bid US$5.08M for a crane with “zero American steel content”. The company said that while establishing a unique design and order process to incorporate US steel content into the crane was technically possible, it would increase delivery time by 18 months and the cost of the crane by at least 35% to around US$7M or more.

In the end, FHWA decided that it was ‘financially infeasible’ for the Maine DOT to ask Liebherr to take this path, and a waiver was issued.

This month, President Joe Biden announced that Livia Shmavonian will lead the new ‘Made in America Office’ created within the White House Office of Management and Budget. It can be expected that there will be a lot more emphasis on the US-made components in equipment, as well as the steel structure itself, and that waivers and will be more difficult and take longer to obtain.

This is problematic. There are US domestic component suppliers, including for items such as brakes, crane cabs, cables and drives and controls, but they also have non-domestic content in their products. Drive supplier TMEIC, for example, has made a major commitment to the US market. TMEIC Corporation Americas is a US-based company that, in 2021, merged its North American manufacturing operation in Katy, Texas, with its drives and control business in Roanoke, Virginia. The company advises that its container automation solutions contain over 60% US content with engineering, equipment, and commissioning.