A new study adds fuel to an ongoing dispute between Congress and the Department of Homeland Security. The issue: screening U.S.-bound shipping containers.
The report, sponsored by the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, contends that DHS’ cargo scanning process is grossly ineffective.
DHS said last year that it would not meet a 2012 deadline that was set by Congress to electronically screen all containers headed for the United States. Instead, it planned to collect more information about the boxes’ origin and content.
Under this system, only a fraction of the 11 million containers sent to the United States each year would be screened for nuclear or radiological material.
But Congress criticized the move, and accused DHS of making excuses for not meeting the deadline.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection, a DHS agency, uses the shipping manifest — a document identifying a container’s sender, recipient and contents — to determine which boxes to scan. The data are analyzed at CBP’s National Targeting Center in Arlington, Va., where suspect cargo is flagged for inspection. The process is part of the Secure Container Initiative — an effort to secure boxes entering U.S. ports.
But if the manifest is inaccurate or incomplete, suspicious cargo might go unnoticed.
Scott Borgerson, visiting fellow for ocean governance at the Council on Foreign Relations, who is familiar with the study, said DHS’ system causes disruptions, as port workers must move cargo around until the offending box is located.
Currently, authorities can only scan about 4 percent of a port’s containers, the study said. If the rate reached 5 percent, the backlog would result in gridlock and scanning would cost a minimum of $108.77 per unit, the study calculated.
The authors used computer models to compare the current screening method to an alternative one that simply scans all boxes. They proposed that DHS switch to this “industry-centric” process, which would cost $10 per unit, the study said.
The authors of “Measuring the Operational Impact of Container Inspections at International Ports” are Nitin Bakshi, professor at the London Business School; Stephen E. Flynn, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations; and, Noah Gans, professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
They pored over data from two of the world’s largest shipping terminals. They analyzed the flow of every container entering and leaving during one month in 2006 — roughly 400,000 to 500,000 records.
DHS has been briefed on the report, Borgerson said. “My guess is that their reaction will not be favorable, because [DHS] has chosen a different path.”
Still, the new administration could warm to the proposal. “I don’t think the final page [of the saga] has been written,” Borgerson said.