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SCA Weekly Report | June 21 - 25, 2021
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CMMC Readiness Assessment
The FY21 NDAA directed GAO to conduct a comprehensive audit of DoD’s Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) Program Office and its newly established CMMC-Accreditation Body. The Information Technology Acquisition Advisory Council conducted the CMMC Readiness Assessment. The assessment can be accessed HERE.
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Shipbuilders Council of America 2021 Shipyard Safety Awards
WASHINGTON – The Shipbuilders Council of America (SCA), the national association representing the U.S. shipbuilding, maintenance, and repair industry, recently announced the recipients of its annual shipyard safety awards.
SCA honors shipbuilding and repair organizations with the “Excellence in Safety”, “Improvement in Safety”, and “Significant Safety Achievement” awards each year for enhancement of operations and promotion of safety and accident prevention.
SCA awarded nine U.S. shipyards in total, with BAE Systems Norfolk Ship Repair and Bollinger Shipyards receiving both the “Excellence in Safety” and “Improvement in Safety” awards. All recipients showed exemplary operations standards and prioritized safety and accident prevention to the highest degree, despite the challenges posed to the industry by COVID-19 throughout 2020.
“U.S. shipyards are dedicated to upholding the highest safety standards and advancing safe practices for our workforce, and as such, were prepared and ready to take on the challenges brought on by COVID-19,” said SCA President Matthew Paxton. “We commend these yards for not only rising to the occasion to keep our country operating during the pandemic, but also for continuing to prioritize the well being of this essential workforce.”
The following shipyards were recognized for their safety practices this year:
Receiving both the “Excellence in Safety” and “Improvement in Safety” Awards:
- BAE Systems Norfolk Ship Repair (Norfolk, Va.)
- Bollinger Shipyards (Lockport, La.)
Receiving the “Excellence in Safety” Award:
- Austal USA (Mobile, Ala.)
- BAE Systems Jacksonville Ship Repair (Jacksonville, Fla.)
- Boston Ship Repair, Division of North Atlantic Ship Repair (Boston, Mass.)
- Fincantieri Marinette Marine (Marinette, Wisc.)
- MHI Ship Repair & Services (Hampton Roads, Va.)
- Southwest Shipyard, L.P. (Channelview, Texas)
Receiving the “Improvement in Safety” Award:
- Fincantieri Bay Shipbuilding (Sturgeon Bay, Wisc.)
Receiving the “Significant Safety Achievement” Award:
- Southwest Shipyard, L.P. (Channelview, Texas)
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MARAD SHIPYARD ECONOMIC IMPACT STUDY
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Nation’s Shipyards Support $42.4 Billion in Gross Domestic Product
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration (MARAD) announced the release of a new report finding that the Nation’s private shipyards support $42.4 billion in gross domestic product (GDP). MARAD’s new report— The Economic Importance of the U.S. Private Shipbuilding and Repairing Industry—measures the economic importance of the shipbuilding and repairing industry at the national and state levels for calendar year 2019.
“Shipyards create good jobs and support economic growth–not just in the areas surrounding our ports and waterways, but across the nation,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
In 2019, the nation’s 154 private shipyards directly provided more than 107,000 jobs and contributed $9.9 billion in labor income to the national economy. On a nationwide basis— including direct, indirect, and induced impacts—the industry supported 393,390 jobs, $28.1 billion of labor income, and $42.4 billion in GDP.
The final report can be accessed HERE.
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Pentagon Reissues FY 22 Shipbuilding Totals to Congress In Lieu of 30-Year Plan
The Pentagon submitted an abbreviated long-range shipbuilding report to Congress that does not show construction past the Fiscal Year 2022 budget request. Instead, the Navy issued a summary of the eight-ship FY 2022 shipbuilding request, with a promise for the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the service to further refine the needs of the Navy for a complete outlook as part of the Fiscal Year 2023 budget submission.
In lieu of the traditional tables that would have outlined the Navy’s projected buys through 2052, the Thursday plan published a chart that, “depicts ranges for critical naval platforms that, taken together with broader Naval and Joint Force capabilities, incorporate combat effectiveness, production feasibility, and likely fiscal limits. Investment priorities include ensuring sufficient capacity in our survivable and lethal submarine force, maintaining the Joint Force’s most survivable and adaptable aviation base in the aircraft carrier, and increasing the small surface combatant force to better support distributed maritime operations.”
The document can be viewed HERE.
Harker: Navy Planning New Multi-Year Destroyer Buy
The Navy plans to enter into another multi-year contract for the Arleigh Burke-class Flight III destroyers, the acting secretary confirmed to Congress on Thursday.The service will sign a contract for Fiscal Year 2023 through 2027, acting Navy Secretary Thomas Harker told the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee.
“Multi-year contracts are very important to us. We do intend to sign another multi-year for DDGs starting in ‘23 through ‘27 and continue that procurement into the foreseeable future,” Harker told Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), the panel’s ranking member. “DDG-51 is a very valuable asset for us.”
Harker did not say how many more destroyers the service plans to purchase under the future multi-year contract.
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Shipyards Would Benefit in House Military Construction-VA Bill
A draft U.S. House spending bill would allocate $475 million for shipyard infrastructure—$225 million more than President Joe Biden requested and $379 million above this year’s funding. The proposed funding is part of the House Appropriations Committee’s draft fiscal 2022 Military Construction-VA spending measure slated for subcommittee markup today. The draft spending measure can be accessed HERE.
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Congressional Negotiators and White House Agree to Infrastructure Framework
A group of bipartisan senators Wednesday evening announced that they had agreed on an infrastructure framework with the White House. The plan has the same rough contours as an earlier framework released by the group, with around $579 billion in new spending and a long list of ways to pay for the package, according to Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV). It remains unclear whether those funding mechanisms will be enough to pay for the entire package, but senators emerging from a meeting with the White House were optimistic on Wednesday night.
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BOEM and the Army Corps of Engineers Team Up to Speed Offshore Wind Planning
A formal agreement between the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the Army Corps of Engineers will pull more resources into federal planning for offshore wind energy, helping BOEM deal with the Biden administration’s big push to open more federal waters to leasing. The agreement allows the Army corps to provide BOEM with additional scientific and technical resources needed to evaluate offshore wind projects on the Outer Continental Shelf.
The new partnership is the latest development out of a Biden executive order directing closer interagency consultation between the Department of the Interior and Department of Defense to “increase renewable energy production on public lands and in offshore waters, while ensuring robust protection for our lands, waters, and biodiversity and creating good-paying jobs,” the agency says.
Since March, BOEM and Interior have been keeping up a drumbeat of new developments, from promising up to 10 environmental reviews this year for East Coast wind projects, to speeding up plans for floating wind turbines off California and soliciting interest from wind developers in Gulf of Mexico sites.
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Royal Caribbean's First "Trial Cruise" Departs Miami
In a long-awaited moment for the North American cruise industry, Royal Caribbean has begun its first "simulated" trial cruise, putting it on track to resume commercial operations at Florida's mega-cruise ports this summer. On Sunday, the Royal Caribbean cruise ship Freedom of the Seas departed PortMiami, carrying about 600 vaccinated employees on a trial cruise to test out the company's COVID-19 prevention protocols. Her destination is CocoCay, Royal Caribbean's private island destination. All of the participants are volunteers, and a representative from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control is on board to monitor the outcome. To meet requirements for the test, the ship must carry at least 10 percent of the maximum number of passengers that the line plans to carry when it returns to service, and all the passengers and crew have to agree to COVID-19 testing before and after. Post-cruise contact tracing will determine whether anyone became infected with the virus.
Out-of-Control Shipping Costs Fire up Prices From Coffee to Toys
Transporting a 40-foot steel container of cargo by sea from Shanghai to Rotterdam now costs a record $10,522, a whopping 547% higher than the seasonal average over the last five years, according to Drewry Shipping. With upwards of 80% of all goods trade transported by sea, freight-cost surges are threatening to boost the price of everything from toys, furniture and car parts to coffee, sugar and anchovies, compounding concerns in global markets already bracing for accelerating inflation. A confluence of factors — soaring demand, a shortage of containers, saturated ports and too few ships and dock workers — have contributed to the squeeze on transportation capacity on every freight path. Recent COVID-19 outbreaks in Asian export hubs like China have made matters worse.
Metal Shark Alabama Delivers Third Inland Towboat to Florida Marine
Metal Shark’s Bayou La Batre, AL, shipyard has delivered its third river towboat for Florida Marine Transporters Inc. The new towboat is the final delivery in a three-vessel contract with FMT announced in late 2018, following Metal Shark’s acquisition of the assets of Horizon Shipbuilding earlier that year. With the purchase, Metal Shark, best known as a builder of welded aluminum vessels, assumed ownership of a fully developed Alabama shipyard and began its expansion into steel shipbuilding, refit, and repair.
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If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Paula Zorensky on the SCA staff.
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