Waupaca Foundry | PartingLINE

Senate Democrats have settled on how to funnel more money into the automotive sector using all-electric vehicles and environmentalism. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and West Virginia's Joe Manchin have reportedly agreed on a proposal that would expand the $7,500 tax credit for EVs while also introducing a new $4,000 subsidy for used models.

Greater Milwaukee Committee members were warned that China could present manufacturers with a larger problem than Russia.

All eyes are focused on the situation unfolding between Russia and Ukraine. And this is particularly true when it comes to the supply chain and logistics industries.

The supply chain and logistics sectors have already dealt with numerous hurdles over the last 24 months. The unfortunate events in Ukraine are compounding the disruptions. With 200 million tons of transit potential, Ukraine is a central cog in the global supply chain.

Foundries are an important player of the European value chain and home to many qualified workers in rural areas. 70 percent of the approx. 4 700 foundries with 300 000 employees operating in EU are considered small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME), operating mainly in regions, already having suffered from industrial decline in recent years. Their survival is of utmost importance for regional development and prosperity.

China dominates the production of iron-based batteries thanks to a series of key patents, which have allowed the country to make 95% of the world's lithium iron phosphate batteries.

What happens when the London Metal Exchange runs out of metal? That’s the question the exchange is urgently trying to address for its flagship copper contract, which sets the global price for one of the world’s most important commodities.

The problem stems from the LME’s physical nature: anyone holding a contract to expiry becomes the owner of a package of metal in an LME warehouse. On the other hand, anyone who has sold one must deliver the metal when the contract expires.

President Joe Biden tried to reassure Americans on Wednesday that he can tame high inflation, announcing a deal to expand operations at the Port of Los Angeles as prices keep climbing and container ships wait to dock in a traffic jam threatening the U.S. economy and holiday shopping.

The automaker plans to commercialize a technology that promises to eliminate the use of coking coal — a major pollutant.

In this April 6, 2021 photo, crew members stand on the bow as the CMA CGM Argentina arrives at PortMiami, the largest container ship to call at a Florida port in Miami. Importers are contending with a perfect storm of supply trouble — rising prices, overwhelmed ports, a shortage of ships, trains, trucks — that is expected to last into 2022.

Form Energy says it has built a low-cost iron-air battery that can discharge electricity for days, which could have big ramifications for storing electricity on the power grid.

China and the U.S. are shipping goods to each other at the briskest pace in years, making the world’s largest bilateral trade relationship look as if the protracted tariff war and pandemic never happened.

Eighteen months after the Trump administration signed the trade deal, the agreement has turned out to be a truce at best. The U.S. trade deficit hasn’t shrunk, most levies are still in place, and it hasn’t led to negotiations over other economic issues.

The American Metals Supply Chain Institute (AMSCI) objects to a ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit confirming that the US President can adjust Section 232 tariffs long after they were first implemented.

In a split decision on Tuesday July 13, the three-judge panel overturned a US Court of International Trade (CIT) ruling that put a time limit on presidential tariff authority under Section 232.

Steelmakers in the United States applauded a ruling by the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that confirmed the US President can boost Section 232 tariffs long after they were first implemented.

In the two-to-one decision on Tuesday July 13, the three-judge panel overturned a US Court of International Trade (CIT) ruling that put a time limit on presidential tariff authority under Section 232.

There’s a wide imbalance within the seaport shipping and receiving ecosystem. Cargo volumes are high, as imports outnumber exports. And shortages in labor and storage space at marine terminals are only making the problem worse. Because of this, serious bottlenecks are causing container dwell times to increase at the ports.

Manufacturers and their supply chain leaders are entering a unique period of time. As the world looks to get back on track, both socially and economically following a historic pandemic, new realities are being meshed with lessons-learned to formulate advanced inventory, production and sourcing strategies. Worthy of greater consideration, according to not-for-profit standards developer GSI US, is a circular approach to supply chains.

Despite worker shortages, employers added 850,000 jobs in June as COVID cases declined, economy reopened and vaccinations increased.

Lumber futures tanked more than 40% in June alone, suffering their worst month on record dating back to 1978.

A key steel product used in construction and automobiles reached a record Monday as U.S. President Joe Biden pushes ahead with his infrastructure spending plans.

Hot-rolled coil for July delivery rose 0.7% to $1,800 a short ton in New York, an all-time high, extending gains since the president secured a $579 billion bipartisan infrastructure deal on Thursday. Prices have more than tripled in a year.

A $300 per week supplemental unemployment payment has become a political lightning rod, but Wisconsin's workforce woes go much deeper than that.

The top U.S. maritime regulator said stretched global supply chains pushing ocean-freight rates to record highs may stay strained into 2022. The supply snarls are colliding with a surge in demand for goods as the world’s largest economy heads for peak shipping season — July and August, when retailers build inventories heading into the year-end holidays.

The number of U.S. manufacturing jobs created by reshoring activities and foreign direct investment increased in 2020 – hitting a total of 160,649 – according to the Reshoring Initiative’s 2020 Data Report.

Of this total, 109,000 jobs were directly related to bringing offshoring production to the U.S. It’s the first time reshoring outpaced FDI in seven years. 2020’s activity brings the total number of reshoring and FDI job announcements to over 1 million since 2010.

Apologies for all the semiconductor news. But it’s the topic of the day, with the United States Senate recently approving $52 billion in emergency spending to help bolster domestic chip production and another $190 billion for R&D programs.

Pundits love to use the term Industry 4.0 to describe the future of manufacturing. But what does the term really mean, and how will the tenets of Industry 4.0 impact day-to-day manufacturing operations?

Industry 4.0 stands for “the Fourth Industrial Revolution,” explains an April 5, 2016 Forbes magazine article.

Spending on services in April was still 3% below February 2020 while spending on goods was 18.2% higher. Aside from the tight driver market, this surge in spending on goods is the most important factor in why trucking is so strong today.

The pace of job gains over the next decade will slow considerably amid a sharp decline in the active labor force and an aging population, according to Labor Department projections released Tuesday.