Strike at the St. Lawrence Seaway | De-icing salt may be missing

Shipowners fear the walkout will lead to an “irreplaceable” loss of inventory

Winter promises to be slippery in the Montreal area if the St. Lawrence Seaway remains paralyzed. There will be no time to replenish de-icing salt reserves, warn bulk carrier owners. For goods like grains and mining products, the countdown is speeding up because of the labor conflict.

Beyond the economic repercussions and supply chain disruptions, shipowners decided to offer concrete examples of what could happen if the walkout, which was in its second day on Monday, drags on. The Desgagnés Group served a written warning to eight federal elected officials, including Quebec ministers Pablo Rodriguez (Transport), Mélanie Joly (Foreign Affairs) and Steven Guilbeault (Environment).

“The port of Salaberry-de-Valleyfield constitutes an essential entry point for salt used in road maintenance,” writes David Rivest, president and CEO of Desgagnés Logistik, in a letter that The Press was able to consult.

At Groupe CSL, the director of government and external affairs, Guillaum Dubreuil, agrees. The man who is also president of the board of directors of Armateurs du Saint-Laurent also believes that this scenario also threatens Ontario.

After the labor dispute which interrupted activities at the port of Vancouver last summer, the Trudeau government must intervene in the St. Lawrence Seaway file to resolve the impasse, argues Mr. Dubreuil.

“There may be towns that will not receive full quantities of road salt for the winter,” he said. Even cities like Toronto could run out of salt depending on the severity of the winter we’re going to have. »

Bad time

The network of 15 locks that connects the lower St. Lawrence River to the Great Lakes generally ceases operations around the end of December. According to government information, this is attributable to “significant ice” accumulation which “prevents safe operation” of the system during the winter.

The strike by some 360 ​​Unifor union members is disrupting shipping activities at a critical time in the season, which also coincides with the arrival of grain harvests from the West on the East Coast before being exported internationally. The labor dispute also led to the closure of two locks (Eisenhower and Snell) on American territory.

According to Mr. Rivest, it is in the fall that de-icing salt transported from the Magdalen Islands and Ontario, in particular, is stored. Without access to locks, it is impossible to supply sensitive sites like the ports of Salaberry-de-Valleyfield and Sainte-Catherine, he adds. A bulk carrier transports the equivalent of what can be transported by “between 400 and 500 trucks”, says the director of Desgagnés Logistik.

“There is a lot of salt transported during this period when we are piling it up before winter distribution,” explains Mr. Rivest.

A ship can transport up to 25,000 tonnes of de-icing salt, explains the director of operations and development at the Port of Salaberry-de-Valleyfield, Isabelle Viau. During a telephone interview, however, she did not want to quantify the extent of the reserves that are usually found on the site.

“It’s shipped by truck to surrounding municipalities,” she said. It can reach certain municipalities in the Montreal region. »

At the time these lines were written, the MTQ had not responded to questions from The Press regarding the supply of de-icing salt.

A puzzle

For operators of bulk carriers and lakers, the strike is already looking like a headache. Some 15 CSL Group vessels are stuck in the Great Lakes. At Fednav, around fifteen boats, some 10% of the company’s total fleet, are blocked.

“It’s already a huge problem,” underlines the director of external relations, Nicole Trépanier. It’s like playing Tetris. We try to move the pieces so that everything fits. If the strike persists, we will have around ten other ships affected. Contracts are given in advance. There are some that we cannot honor. »

Among the Saint-Laurent Shipowners, several members are already canceling trips planned for the end of the season on the Seaway. On average, eight days are needed to make a round trip from one end of the corridor to the other, explains Mr. Dubreuil.

“We are approaching three days of strike and we have between four and five days to catch up,” he said.

At the Quebec Trucking Association (ACQ), the president and CEO, Marc Cadieux, also fears negative repercussions on his industry, especially if the strike continues.

“We, from the moment [la marchandise] is in transformation, we are involved, so people at home fear that when the bottleneck tightens in the second phase, especially in construction materials and steel, we will take a real hit in the kidneys”, illustrates -he.

In a letter sent to the federal Minister of Labor, Seamus O’Regan, the president of the ACQ even says he fears a “cascade of delays which will create increased demand for our industry, increase costs and impose pressure on our greatly disrupted sector by the labor shortage. After the COVID-19 crisis, “the Canadian economy and our supply chains cannot afford another disruption,” says Mr. Cadieux.

With Henri-Ouellette Vézina, The Press