Toyota Motor Sales has renewed its lease at the port of Long Beach for the import of vehicles through its Pier B vehicle processing facilities. The 20-year lease, which will run to the end of 2028 (it is retroactive to January 2009), involves a $240m investment in 58-hectare site. Toyota will be paying approximately $12m per year in rent to the port for the life of the lease. The rental amount is renegotiated every five years, per the agreement.
The last long-term lease was signed in 1990 and expired in 2006. The company has been operating on interim leases since then.
The carmaker imports between 200,000 and 300,000 vehicles a year through the port from Japan, including Toyota, Lexus and Scion models.
The new lease requires Toyota to take measures that will decrease air pollution related to its operations, including the use of cleaner fuel by its car carrying vessels.
Toyota contracted vessels calling at the Toyota Logistics Services’ Long Beach vehicle distribution centre will burn low-sulphur fuel in compliance with California Air Resources Board (CARB) regulations said the company. This includes a voluntarily extension of the CARB fuel compliance distance from the 24 nautical miles required by CARB to 40 nautical miles of Port Fermin, over which the vessels will reduce speed to 12 knots.
There are also targets to reduce time at berth. “Overall, we intend to reduce our average time at berth by 25% through kaizen or improvement of our operations, so our ships can depart even faster and reduce our at berth emission footprint,” said a spokesman for Toyota Motor Sales.
Toyota’s ocean carriers include K-Line, NYK Lines, Toyofuji Lines, Mitsui OSK Line and Great American Lines.
In partnership with the port, Toyota will conduct a study, using an outside environmental consulting firm, to determine current at-berth emission levels. The study will include multiple vessels of varying age and engine/auxiliary configurations, said the company, utilizing the type or grade of fuel required by the CARB regulations. The budget for the study is agreed not to exceed $50K and will be equally funded by Toyota and the Port of Long Beach.
In addition, Toyota has also committed to at least 95% of the truck fleet being upgraded or replaced to EPA 2007 standards, and 50% being upgraded or replaced to meet 2010 standards by 2014.
“All of our highway as well as rail carriers are Smart Way environmentally certified carriers,” said the spokesman. “Toyota-contracted trucks at the Port of Long Beach will be required to meet these standards as well.”
Toyota’s commitment at the port requires that it take measures to decrease air pollution related to its operations including the use of cleaner fuel by its car carrying vessels.
*In a separate development, the company has announced that it will stop imports of its Camry model to North America from Japan following the launch of the redesigned version later this month. The move is designed to help boost local production of the Camry in the US to offset exchange rate losses. The vehicle will be manufactured at Toyota’s Georgetown facility in Kentucky and at the Subaru facility in Indiana. The company is targeting annual sales of 360,000 Camrys in North America.
