PORT AUTOMATION

Report: ILA, USMX met on port automation

Union dockworkers and employers have taken the first steps toward reaching an agreement on the use of container-handling automation that would avoid a crippling strike at U.S. Eastern Seaboard and Gulf coast ports.

Leaders of the International Longshoremen’s Association and United States Maritime Alliance met in private Sunday in an effort to find a way forward on the issue of automation, which has been a major obstacle to a new labor agreement covering tens of thousands of longshore workers. 

The...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/report-ila-usmx-met-on-port-automation

Labor warns Alabama port authority seeks ‘back door’ to automation

A labor union is warning regulators that the federal government would be subsidizing future job cuts as well as a drive toward freight automation if a Buy America waiver sought by the Alabama State Port Authority (ASPA) is approved.

ASPA told the Federal Railroad Administration that the waiver is necessary in order to purchase two rubber-tired gantry cranes that it wants to install at its planned intermodal container transfer facility (ICTF) in Montgomery, Alabama.

Projects that receive funding...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/labor-warns-alabama-port-authority-seeks-back-door-to-automation

Biden’s Supply Chain Envoy Says Automating Ports Doesn’t Have to Cost Jobs

By Laura Curtis (Bloomberg) — The White House’s supply-chain envoy said the ports and logistics industry must move toward automation, a sticking point in protracted contract talks between US West Coast dockworkers and their employers. Automation is inevitable and the industry should “move there deliberately as opposed to getting dragged,” Stephen Lyons said Tuesday.  Lyons, along with outgoing Labor Secretary Marty Walsh, have been involved in negotiations between the International Longshore...

https://gcaptain.com/bidens-supply-chain-envoy-says-automating-ports-doesnt-have-to-cost-jobs/

Billions in port grants rolled into Democrats’ inflation bill

Container terminal at Port of Houston.

Billions of dollars in federal grants aimed at reducing air pollution at seaports are included in the Democrats’ inflation bill with the caveat that the money cannot be used to automate container terminals.

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, announced last week by Senators Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., is a pared down version of President Joe Biden’s “Build Back Better” package introduced last year but never passed.

The new version, which backers say will...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/billions-in-port-grants-rolled-into-democrats-inflation-bill

New DOT panel to focus on deploying automation in transportation

U.S. Department of Transportation Building

The U.S. Department of Transportation is creating a board that will make recommendations on transportation innovation, with automation and workforce growth envisioned as core issues.

Plans for the Transforming Transportation Advisory Committee (TTAC) were detailed in a public notice on Tuesday. The TTAC charter will be effective for two years after the notice is published in the Federal Register, scheduled for Wednesday.

According to the notice, the committee will have up to 25 members appointed...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/new-dot-panel-to-focus-on-deploying-transportation-automation

Auto suppliers red-flag port automation on FMC agenda

Anti-automation sentiment from dockworkers and pending legislation discouraging the practice at container terminals should be enough to prioritize the issue on the Federal Maritime Commission’s agenda, a shipper adviser told agency officials Wednesday.

Speaking at the December meeting of the FMC’s National Shipper Advisory Committee (NSAC), Steven Hughes, who represents the Motor & Equipment Manufacturers Association on the panel, said the recent developments on automation could hamper progress...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/auto-suppliers-red-flag-port-automation-on-fmc-agenda

Kalmar moves towards 5G

Kalmar’s article

In the future, 5G will fulfill port automation needs for reliability, capacity, speed and security. Kalmar has successfully conducted one of the industry’s first trials with ultra-reliable, low-latency 5G technology in collaboration with Nokia.

Pekka Yli-Paunu, Director of Automation Research at Kalmar, reviews the trial with satisfaction. Expectations for 5G technology have been high in the field of cargo handling, and now they are backed up by test results. 5G supports a wide...

http://container-news.com/kalmar-moves-towards-5g/