Savannah Port to undergo $2.3B expansion

If we can take a live look at Savannah right now at the Savannah River, where it's a beautiful picture-perfect day down there as we're getting a live look right now, where a major port expansion has cleared a key hurdle. A new $2.3 billion container terminal is planned with potential benefits for businesses and workers across our state. So we're going to talk about this. Georgia Ports Authority President Kevin Price joins us now live. Kevin, I really appreciate you being here. Obviously, this is big news for you guys. Yeah, it's great news for us, Tyler. That permit was about three and a half years in the making with a bunch of people working with the Army Corps to get that ready. But it's important for not just us, but for Georgia as a whole, as when you look at the economic impact of the port, you can relate one in eight jobs back to the port. You know, Georgia's employment has grown by about a percent, which is sixth highest in the nation. And, you know, I saw Governor Kemp's going to announce today that Mitsubishi's investing another $490 million in an expansion. So for us to be able to get this in place and prepare for the future, it's a great thing. And so, Kevin, what does this approval mean for the port's future? So over the next 10 years, we're supposed to grow by about 55 percent, Tyler, which will put us kind of at a capacity stretch if we didn't have this expansion. So now we're able to expand across the river. So when that new volume comes, we'll be prepared for it and ready to go. Instead of waiting for it to get here and then building it, right, and causing congestion and not have the network flow correctly, this allows us to stay ahead of it, which has been what the Georgia Ports Authority plan is. We have a 10-year plan of investing and growing to keep a buffer of capacity for when we have, you know, for when volume surges upwards, we're prepared for it. point. So we have viewers all across the state of Georgia, in fact, all across the southeast watching us right now. So what is this going to mean for people just beyond Savannah? I mean, how is this going to affect people in metro Atlanta in terms of jobs and different businesses? So what's great about the port here is we have inland ports that serve northeast and northwest Georgia. We take freight all the way to the Midwest, to Dallas, and all the way up to Chicago by rail. So we affect jobs all over the southeast. And again, like I referred to earlier, one in eight jobs in the state can be tied back to have some ties to the port. So when you're able to continue to build, and you build distribution centers and manufacturing, and you work with GDOT and the economic development people to put a plan in place and a network to handle this capacity to handle this volume coming in it just means more jobs for georgians and it allows us to connect georgians to the rest of the world as well so it's not just import freight it's being able to help export our products as well our forestry products which is a big market for us well and obviously this is going to take several years till it's completed this big expansion but obviously you guys are seeing forecasts for increases in demand can you talk a little bit about what you guys are seeing in terms of trade and the customer demand that tells you that this additional capacity is not only needed, but is going to be utilized pretty quickly? So like I admit, we work with economists every two years to go through a 10-year plan. And based on that 10-year plan, we're expecting to see about a 55% growth. So last year, we did 5.7 million TEUs. So 55% increase over the next 10 years puts us somewhere around 9, 9.5 million TEUs. Right. So that that growth and that demand to come here is based on a lot of things. One, you know, as the governor said hundreds of times, we are the easiest state in the nation to do business with 13 years in a row. We have the network that that not just a terminal network, but a rail network and road network based with our partners, GDOT and CSX and Norfolk Southern. that is second to none that allows us to be very efficient move cargo in and out of the port very quickly well and so this is something that just came to my mind the Honda meta plant that opened a couple of years ago or about a year and a half two years ago uh just a little bit inland from Savannah do facilities like that help you guys be able to show the need for the increase uh in capacity because obviously some of those items are going to come right off or a good portion of items and everything used to help assemble these vehicles are going to come right off the port of Savannah get driven to the plant and then it's going to be put together right well Tyler you just took my whole answer yeah yes so that plants like that those announcements not only not only help drive the port because of what they need to build the cars but but what they need from you know at the store what what you need for housing right you know all the big box retailers bringing supplies through the port, right? So when you have that big announcement and you move all those jobs there, you also get all the secondary stuff that goes with it, such as people need new houses, so they need new furniture, right? And that all comes through the port, which there's a lot of secondary needs that we meet that allow us to continue to grow. So it's not just the announcement of the plant and those jobs. There's a bunch of secondary jobs and secondary benefits that we get from that. And just one more quick question, obviously with a port like this, because I used to live in Mobile, which is known as the port city for the Gulf Coast for us down there. And up here in Atlanta, these items that are coming off the port of Savannah and things, and obviously the port of Brunswick, it falls under you guys as well, but the port of Savannah, it's going, as you mentioned, up to the Midwest. I mean, pretty much a lot of businesses have the choice of where they're going to send their goods, right? Yes. So, you know, we have, when you look at LA Long Beach right they they're the shortest route that from Asia and then you look at New York New Jersey they have a population that moves freight there people move freight through Savannah because we're very efficient um we're very easy to do business with so when they have a choice you know they're choosing to come here to Georgia and Savannah um which has allowed us to grow we're the third largest uh port in the nation um and we've been the fastest growing port for the last 25 years because of not just the port, but all the factors that work together with it. Kevin Price, I really appreciate your time. Obviously, you're a busy man. It's going to get even busier once this new expansion opens up in the coming years, in the 2030s. So congratulations to you guys in getting this approval. And obviously, this will be some great news for not only you guys, but also the state of Georgia and the Southeast. Kevin Price, President of the Georgia Ports Authority. Thanks so much for being here. Thanks, Tyler.