Tag: Jones Act

On March 29, 2022 the U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation – H.R. 6728 – that included a provision in Section 518 (as we have previously reported) that would impose burdensome new citizenship-based restrictions on crews of foreign flag vessels that work on offshore energy projects on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf (“OCS”).  This provision would require mariners on foreign flagged vessels operating on the OCS be either U.S. citizens, permanent residents (green card holders), or citizens of the nation of the flag state of the vessel, in contravention of longstanding international principles that regulation and credentialing of crews are

The International Marine Contractors Association (IMCA) provides the following update to its Information Note (1606) published on March 1, 2022 on H.R. 6728, a proposed amendment to the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (“OCSLA”) that would impose burdensome new citizenship-based restrictions on crews of foreign flag vessels that work on offshore energy projects on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf (“OCS”). This legislation remains under active consideration by the U.S. Congress.  In order to better understand the adverse impacts of this legislation IMCA explains, from a practical perspective, how this proposed legislation would result in unnecessary and severe administrative burdens without

The International Marine Contractors Association (IMCA) has published on its website a new Information Note that should be of interest to IMCA Members with offshore oil and gas and renewable energy businesses in the United States. This relates to new proposed legislative amendments called the American Offshore Worker Fairness Act that would dramatically change citizenship crewing requirements for vessels engaged in offshore energy support operations on the outer continental shelf of the United States.  Specifically, Members should be aware of proposed legislative changes that would undermine a regulatory scheme that has served the offshore energy industry well for decades by

The International Marine Contractors Association (IMCA) has published on its website a new Information Note that should be of interest to the offshore oil and gas and renewable energy industries based on a new development related to enforcement of the Jones Act and Vessel Crewing. Specifically, stakeholders should be aware of the evolving methods used by pro-Jones Act advocates to draw attention to offshore operations that they claim to be noncompliant with applicable coastwise and vessel crewing laws. An industry group has deployed a surveillance vessel, the Jones Act Enforcer, to monitor and report suspected Jones Act and other violations