Posted on 18 Jul 2018
Shell and Chevron are the first oil and gas industry players granted waivers from President Donald Trump’s 25% tariff on steel imports, after the administration agreed the specialty steel they were importing isn’t manufactured in the US.
The US Commerce Department approved tariff exclusions for 2,760 short tons of steel casing and production tubing Shell said it will use when drilling wells in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, Argus reported. It also gave a tariff waiver to Chevron for 80 st of corrosion-resistant stainless steel tubing.
The exemptions will last one year and are exclusive to the two companies, Kallanish understands.
The Commerce Department has been working through a backlog of more than 20,000 steel tariff exclusion requests. The agency has processed a total of 280 requests since it began issuing waiver decisions on 21 June.
Commerce separately rejected Shell’s requests for waivers on another 1,630 tons of steel products and rejected Chevron’s requests for waivers on 309 tons of steel tubing. The agency said the applications were incomplete but could be resubmitted.
