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One of the posts:
david alba •In coming months, you will see a national and likely international story on the GRID Project. A proposal to build a 21st Century Container Supply Chain Container Port in the U.S. specifically designed to service the industry's largest class container vessels (up to 18,000 TEU that cut CO2 emissions by up to 40% over older smaller ships).
Our container platform using new crane technology will cut vessel berthing dwell time by over 50% (a game changer in this $400B a year business) and use cold ironing to shut down engines on ships while berthed. One of our targeted trade gateways is Southern California's Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, a physically conjoined water way in the San Pedro Bay, where 50% of the nation's class 1 doublestacked container trains deliver to and from these dual connected ports. Also, combined, they are the 7th largest container trade gateway on Earth moving about 16M TEU in and out of Southern California.
The basic idea is to consolidate a new direct ship to rail interface pier designed vertical container terminal and platform (SuperDock) loading and discharging containers to Class 1 trains in real time for immediate inland delivery and also connecting to an electrified rail freight pipeline system delivering containers using pipeline technology modified from the water transmission industry (except we move boxes on rail and keep the water out of the 15 to
18ft diameter pipe/tunnel way fastened with electric track). By eliminating the need to store containers at
container terminals by over 70%, we estimate consolidation of 14 fragmented redundant container terminals will
yield over 3,000 acres for new industrial use and revenue to both ports. This 3,000 acre yield will offset a large portion of the tremendous infrastructure costs for the project. The savings to the shipping companies in taking these 100 million dollar operating facilities off their balance sheets will get a smart industry CEO's attention.
The Freight pipeline eliminates the need for nearly 70% of trucks to travel to and from the ports on our Southern California's freeway networks reducing hundreds of millions of truck miles traveled to and from the ports. The boxes are delivered on a pipeline circuit that takes the box to the cities via electric rail fastened within the pipe, and surfacing for transfer to trucks within the centers where the highest density of industrial container warehousing activity (usually 50 to 60 miles from the ports) is zoned.
Our business model will demonstrate that the system will require a significant changing of skillsets for longshoremen labor to operate these machines, new inland facilities, and technology driven systems. It will also demonstrate a net increase of these jobs over time to ensure human resource positions and labor numbers will continue to grow as projected volumes for cargo increase over years.
Like the advent of containerization, the exact opposite of what labor feared and predicted from the new containerized technology (loss of jobs) had actually resulted in a 300% increase of registered Longshoremen when (back then) opponents of containerization accused the new technology of over half a century ago, to be a death sentence for longshoreman labor due to containerization's tremendous and revolutionary efficiency and performance. Today, longshoremen on the West Coast of the US are among the highest paid laborers in the nation. If they become the first to embrace new technology, they will preserve the very jobs re-creating history containerization had brought them over half a century ago. Now over 5 years in development, GRID Logistics Inc. is one such example of a massive infrastructure investment supporting a notoriously polluting industry, and making the most aggressive but realistic innovations where environmental improvements MUST contain compelling business rationale in the form of efficiency, performance, and operational cost savings. gridlogisticsinc.com
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My response:
Wow, David (Alba),
You set out a lot of efficiency improvements in shipping in your neck of the woods. If I may draw out some highlights from your post:
"... consolidate a new direct ship to rail interface ...electrified rail freight pipeline system delivering containers using
pipeline technology modified from the water transmission industry ... that takes the box to the cities via electric rail fastened within the pipe ... eliminates the need for nearly 70% of trucks to travel to and from the ports ... labor numbers will continue to grow ... consolidation of 14 fragmented redundant container terminals will yield
over 3,000 acres for new industrial use and revenue to both ports ..."
While this means that the resource-usage per kg-mile of delivered product will be reduced (which, all things being equal, is a good thing for making the earth's resources go further, there are three challenges I'd raise:
1) Has analysis been done of all the knock-on consequences of this development (a whole system level analysis including all externalities), eg trucking industry impacts are not all positive - fewer truck emmissions (good), but partially offset against the negative impacts on ancilliary industries supporting trucking and the multiplier effect of
the spend of the truckers etc. (eg buying local food on their travels). What is the sustainability footprint of truckers' lifestyles versus Longshoremen's? Is it a straight substitution or are there going to be more reductions in truckers than there are additional Longshoremen?
2) What alternative use will the 3,000 acres be put to? If more sustainable than the previous shipping/transportation
usage, then good, but if occupation is driven by highest financial return, this might not be the case, and therefore there would be negative sustainability impacts to offset against the positive efficiency improvements you mention.
3) Jevons Paradox - will more efficient operations increase total throughput of high-footprint products (eg with high embedded carbon) to satisfy the desires of a highly consumerist society, thereby accelerating the total human system towards resource depletion based cataclism from a planetary scale tipping point?
Perhaps this example illustrates that there is an argument for developing a Whole-System-Impact analysis, along the lines of Environmental Impact Assessments?