Port of L.A. Fails To Meet Pollution-Reduction Requirement, Again

For the second time in recent months, city officials say the Port of Los Angeles has failed to meet pollution-reduction requirements at a shipping terminal, it was reported Tuesday.

The TraPac terminal near Wilmington did not comply with air quality improvement measures the city adopted years ago, including mandates that massive cargo ships shut down their engines and plug into shore-based electricity while docked to reduce harmful diesel emissions, a recent audit by the city-owned port found, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Port officials acknowledged last fall that they had failed for years to enforce similar mandates at the China Shipping North America terminal near San Pedro. Between them, TraPac and China Shipping handle about one-third of the containers moving through the port.

Despite emissions reductions in recent years, the Los Angeles-Long Beach port complex remains the largest single air pollution source in Southern California, with diesel-fueled cargo ships and trucks among the top contributors, The Times reported.

According to documents released last week under the California Public Records Act, ships plugged in to shore power at the TraPac terminal just 53 percent of the time in 2015, far below the requirement of 80 percent.

The port also failed to ensure that all yard equipment at the terminal ran on the cleanest possible Tier 4 diesel engines by 2014 as required by the city, the port’s review found, according to The Times. By that year, only 105 of 135 pieces of equipment met those emissions standards, according to the port.

Gene Seroka, the port’s executive director since 2014, blamed the shortcomings on construction work that prevented ships from using shore power and on last year’s labor-related congestion problems, which left more than two dozen ships waiting in the waters outside the port.

--City News Service, photo via Wiki Commons