Julie Gordon News

Canada's manufacturers on Monday asked the federal government to curb a brewing labor dispute after dockworkers at the country's second largest port said they will work less this week.Unionized dockworkers, who are in talks for a new contract since 2018, will hold a partial strike starting Tuesday, by refusing all overtime outside of their normal day shifts, along with weekend work, they said in a statement on Monday.The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Quebec's 1,125…

With new global emissions standards looming, the marine shipping industry is increasingly looking at liquefied natural gas as alternative to high-sulfur bunker fuel, shipping and energy executives said at a global gas summit this week. Already used to fuel ferry fleets and cruise ships, LNG is gaining traction among freight and cargo shippers, despite a reluctance by the entrenched industry to make major changes. The stakes are high: the global shipping fleet now consumes about 4 million barrels per day of high sulfur fuel oil. "Ship owners are very conservative, they're generally a little slower to act... But it's going to happen," Peter Keller, chairman of SEA\LNG and executive VP of maritime firm Tote Inc, told Reuters at the World Gas Conference in Washington.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Monday said any move by the United States to impose tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum would be a "very bad idea" guaranteed to disrupt trade between the two nations.Trudeau told reporters in Vancouver he was confident the administration of President Donald Trump understood that such tariffs would hurt jobs in the United States as well as Canada.Trump imposed a 25 percent tariff on steel imports and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum in March but granted temporary exemptions to Canada and Mexico that run out on May 1. Canada is the biggest supplier of steel and aluminum to the United States."We have been discussing this with the U.S.

The liquefied natural gas market is growing every year, but the terminals that ship and receive the fuel are shrinking. The booming sector's next-generation infrastructure is being designed for a emerging-market buyers that want smaller volumes on shorter, more flexible contracts. LNG export terminals, where the gas is liquefied and put on vessels for shipping, have traditionally been massive, custom-built facilities that cost tens of billions of dollars. And so to justify the investment, they have typically required equally massive, long-term supply deals, often lasting a decade or more. Numerous terminal projects on the horizon, by contrast…

Dominion Energy Inc said on Tuesday it had no plans to renegotiate any of its liquefied natural gas sales contracts, a day after India's oil minister said state-owned gas processor GAIL (India) Ltd was renegotiating deals with Dominion and another U.S. producer. "The characterization of contract renegotiations is false ... and Dominion Energy does not intend to renegotiate contract terms in the future," the company said in a statement. India's oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan told lawmakers on Monday that GAIL was renegotiating purchase contracts with Dominion Energy and Cheniere Energy Inc…

The Canadian government has approved TransCanada Corp's proposed C$1.7 billion ($1.38 billion) North Montney Mainline natural gas pipeline that would connect natural gas fields in northern British Columbia with a Pacific Coast export terminal. The North Montney line would feed into a second new pipeline, the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission line, that would serve an $11 billion liquefied natural gas export terminal, called the Pacific NorthWest LNG project, proposed by state-owned Malaysian energy company Petronas. The federal natural resources department announced the North Montney approval late on Wednesday. In April, the Canadian regulator…

Maher Terminals Holding Corp said on Tuesday it would boost container-handling capacity by more than half at the Port of Prince Rupert under an expansion of its container terminal at the northern British Columbia port.   The Fairview Container terminal will be expanded to 1.3 million 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs) per year, up from its current capacity of some 850,000 TEUs. Construction is set to start in April and is expected to wrap up by mid-2017.     (Reporting by Julie Gordon)

Port Metro Vancouver said on Thursday that operations had resumed at most port facilities shut down by a shipping container fire the day before, but that its Centerm container terminal was still closed. The chemical fire, which prompted a massive emergency response late on Wednesday and shut down a large portion of Canada's biggest port, continued to smolder at the container yard just east of downtown Vancouver. "Fire officials have isolated the fire and continue to monitor the container," said Port Metro Vancouver spokesman John Parker-Jervis in a statement, adding that there is an 100 meter (330 feet) exclusion zone in place around the burning container. He added that operations had resumed at all other port facilities on the south shore of the Burrard Inlet.

A large portion of Canada's biggest port was shut down on Wednesday after a chemical fire broke out amid numerous shipping containers piled up in a yard east of Vancouver's downtown core. The toxic smoke forced local residents to take shelter inside, while workers at Port Metro Vancouver and in the surrounding area covered their faces with scarves as they streamed out of their offices. By early evening, firefighters were able to bring the blaze under control and residents were allowed to leave their homes, though people were warned to stay away from the port. "Smoke is lessening, but people are encouraged to stay away from the fire area," the City of Vancouver said on its official Twitter account.

Alaska can use an existing British Columbia ferry terminal for several more years if Canada enforces an order blocking so-called "Buy America" purchasing rules from being applied to its reconstruction, a state official said on Tuesday. A $15 million plan to overhaul the Prince Rupert ferry terminal, which is located in Canada, has escalated into a trade dispute with the United States. Alaska has refused to seek a waiver to the controversial law, designed to protect U.S. companies from foreign competition in transportation infrastructure projects. That prompted Canada on Monday to fight back by invoking rarely used anti-sanction laws that would prevent bidders on the project from agreeing to use only U.S.-made iron and steel, potentially delaying construction.

The Canadian government signed an order on Monday blocking the United States from applying controversial "Buy America" purchasing rules on the demolition and reconstruction of a ferry terminal that is located on Canada's Pacific Coast but operated by Alaska's Department of Transportation. The U.S. federal rules are designed to protect U.S. companies from foreign competition in transportation infrastructure projects. The state of Alaska has refused to waive the provisions for the $15 million rebuild of the Prince Rupert, British Columbia, ferry terminal although the project is solidly in Canadian territory. Canada is fighting back by invoking rarely used anti-sanction laws to prevent bidders on the project from agreeing to use only U.S.-made iron and steel.

Victims of the Lac-Megantic oil-by-rail disaster that killed 47 people in the Canadian province of Quebec in 2013 agreed to a nearly $200 million settlement from Montreal Maine and Atlantic Canada Co and its U.S.-based parent company, a lawyer for the victims said in a statement on Friday. The settlement must be approved by the courts. If approved, the funds will be split between the wrongful death claimants, including the victims and their families, personal injury claimants, property damage claimants, insurers and government. (Reporting by Julie Gordon in Vancouver, David Ljunggren and Randall Palmer in Ottawa, editing by G Crosse)

The gridlock at U.S. West Coast ports that has forced McDonald's to ration French fries at its Japanese restaurants and interrupted supplies to retailers such as Lululemon is unlikely to be alleviated by routing cargoes through Canada, whose Pacific ports face their own problems. Capacity is already limited at Canada's largest port, Port Metro Vancouver, which is also staring at the possibility of another crippling strike by container truck drivers. Tensions are mounting as talks to resolve longstanding complaints at the port drag on between government…

Petronas, Malaysia's state-owned oil and gas company, delayed giving the final investment go-ahead on Wednesday for its $11 billion liquefied natural gas export terminal in British Columbia, citing high costs and other outstanding issues. "Costs associated with the pipeline and LNG facility remain challenging and must be reduced further before a positive FID (final investment decision) can be undertaken," the company said in a statement. Petronas, which had hoped to give the project the green light before yearend, said it will continue to invest in natural gas in British Columbia and will keep working to secure necessary federal approvals and permits for the project. (Reporting by Julie Gordon; Editing by Peter Galloway, Reuters)

Kinder Morgan Energy Partners said on Friday that crews have resumed survey work related to its Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project in the Vancouver suburb of Burnaby, even as Canadian police arrested more protesters at two work sites. Kinder Morgan said it was able to move its equipment onto Burnaby Mountain overnight and that crews would be working 24 hours a day for the next 10 to 12 days to complete drilling work required by regulators. The company, which hopes to nearly triple the capacity of the existing 300,000 barrel-per-day pipeline, plans to bore two holes deep into the mountain to test if it can run the expanded line under the conservation site, which is a popular hiking and picnic area for locals.

A  Canadian company jumped into British Columbia's crowded liquefied natural gas (LNG) export fray with a plan to build a $30 billion terminal on Vancouver Island. Steelhead LNG said it applied to Canadian regulators for permission to export up to 30 million tonnes of LNG a year for 25 years, joining a list of fourteen companies vying to build projects in the Pacific Coast province. The National Energy Board has already approved export licenses for nine projects in British Columbia. With Steelhead, it has five more under review, as global and domestic companies scramble to build the facilities needed to ship cheap Canadian gas to energy-hungry Asian markets. "It is a competitive market.

LNG Canada, a joint venture led by Royal Dutch Shell, said on Tuesday that it had awarded the design and eventual construction of its planned liquefied natural gas (LNG) export project on Canada's west coast to CFSW LNG Constructors. The contract covers the front end engineering and design work, as well as the execution of the multi-billion dollar project, pending a final investment decision. That final go or no-go call is not expected until mid-decade. LNG Canada is just one of more than a dozen export terminals planned for British Columbia's rugged Pacific coast, as energy companies look to ship cheap Canadian gas to Asia. The project…

Canada unveiled new rules on Wednesday to enhance pipeline safety and spill response, ahead of the development of new projects proposed to carry crude from Alberta's oil sands to coastal ports for export. The new legislation will give Canada's energy regulator, the National Energy Board (NEB), more power to enforce compliance on safety and the authority to step in to lead spill response if a company is unwilling or unable to do so. Companies will also now be held liable, up to C$1 billion ($917 million), for all spills or incidents on their lines, whether or not they are at-fault or negligent, putting the onus on owners to ensure safe operations.

Canada moved on Tuesday to strengthen its response plan for oil spills at sea ahead of the development of new pipelines that would sharply increase tanker traffic in Canadian waters if they are built. Among the new measures, the federal government said it would remove a per-incident liability cap on a domestic clean-up fund, which means that all the money in the fund could be made available to clean up a single spill. It also pledged to cover spill costs if clean-up funds were exhausted. It also said it will lift its ban on the use of dispersants in cases when using them offers a net environmental benefit. Dispersants are chemicals that break down oil slicks but can also harm marine life.

Unionized container truck drivers at Canada's largest port voted on Saturday to join a strike by their non-unionized colleagues, who walked off the job on Wednesday over a long-running dispute about pay and services. Unifor, which represents about 400 container truck drivers at Port Metro Vancouver, said its drivers voted overwhelmingly in favor of joining the four-day-old work action. The unionized workers must give 72-hour notice before walking off the job. Both groups are demanding that the port streamline operations to improve wait times or pay drivers a fair hourly wage while waiting. They are also asking for better, standardized pay rates to discourage under-cutting.

Container truck drivers at Canada's largest port reached a new deal on Thursday, narrowly avoiding an expanded job action that would have seen some 400 unionized drivers join about 1,200 non-unionized drivers who walked off the job last week. The tentative agreement, which addresses demands made by both unionized and non-unionized drivers at Port Metro Vancouver, came after a morning of intense discussions with a government-appointed mediator and could help get hundreds of millions of dollars worth of products back on the roads. "We have now secured a deal that will hopefully get things back to normal at the port by early next week," said Gavin McGarrigle, British Columbia area director for Unifor, which represents the unionized drivers.

Unionized container truck drivers set up picket lines at Canada's largest port on Monday, joining hundreds of non-unionized workers who walked off the job last month in a dispute over pay and services. They will now join a nearly two-week long strike by non-unionized drivers, which has already crippled operations at the busy port, hitting the export of commodities like lumber and specialized grain products, and the import of consumer goods. "The impact of truckers walking off the job is in the order of about C$885 million ($796.9 million) per week…

Hundreds of construction workers in booming northern British Columbia will take up residence this week in unique digs on board a cruise ferry revamped into a floating luxury hotel. The aging ship will help relieve a housing shortage in one busy Canadian port town already bursting ahead of a promised energy boom that could last more than a decade. The Silja Festival - a Baltic ferry made over as the Delta Spirit Lodge - will spend at least a year docked outside Kitimat, British Columbia, where it will provide housing for about 600 workers in town for Rio Tinto Alcan's $3.3 billion smelter-upgrade project, which is expected to wrap up in 2015.