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POSCO's
steel supply for Alaska LNG project irks US manufacturers
By
Park Jae-hyuk, The Korea Times - An advocacy group for U.S. manufacturers has
voiced concerns over the proposed use of POSCO’s steel for pipelines
transporting liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Alaska, fueling uncertainty over
the Korean steelmaker’s participation in the Donald Trump administration’s
much-hyped energy project.
A week
after POSCO International, the group's trading and energy unit, signed an
agreement Dec. 1 with Glenfarne, the project’s lead developer, regarding the
former’s supply of steel in exchange for importing LNG, the Coalition for a
Prosperous America (CPA) issued a statement raising alarm over the use of
“made-in-Korea” steel.
“A
proposed 807-mile natural gas pipeline intended to bring gas from Alaska’s
North Slope to a new export terminal on the Kenai Peninsula in Southcentral
Alaska will be fabricated in Korea despite the administration’s headline ‘50
percent’ steel tariff,” CPA said Wednesday (local time).
“CPA
is reiterating its call for the Trump administration to prioritize domestic
metal fabricators and not allow the outsourcing of critical infrastructure
supply chains to foreign suppliers, putting our national security perilously at
risk.”
The
organization claimed the method of assessing the 50 percent tariff — based on
what the overseas fabricator said it paid for the steel in its own country —
invites “tariff fraud.”
“CPA
urges the White House and Commerce Department to ensure that fabricated steel
and aluminum products have effective tariff protection by converting ad valorem
tariffs to specific tariffs, as was the norm prior to the GATT (General
Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) era,” it said.
It
also called for a consistent “Made in America” standard across all federal
infrastructure and energy spending.
A
POSCO International official declined to comment on the issue.
According
to sources familiar with the matter, it remains undecided whether the company
will supply finished products made in Korea or only provide raw materials to
local pipe manufacturers. Government-level discussions on Korea’s participation
in the project have also stalled, as Washington has yet to provide details
about its feasibility.
“The
Alaska gas project involves considerable risk,” Industry Minister Kim Jung-kwan
said at the National Assembly last month. “It would be difficult to include
this project in the Korea-U.S. joint investment program.”
