A lone bright spot in struggling shipping sector

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One by one, the concrete pieces are plucked from the dock and lowered by cranes onto the ship moored near the mouth of Lake Ontario. It takes two days to load and lash the cargo – 78 semicircular sections that weigh as much as 50,000 tonnes and stretch 10 metres.

Once assembled, they will form two turbine towers for a power-generating wind farm near Nova Scotia's Bay of Fundy.

But first, the cargo aboard the Rosaire A. Desgagnés has to sail east for six days across the lake and through the St. Lawrence Seaway, past idled steel mills and unneeded ships tied up at piers.

It's a route that has seen fewer ships this season, as cargo volumes have dropped on the 3,700-kilometre waterway that connects the interior of North America with global ports.

The Seaway's main industrial cargoes of coal and iron ore have plunged in the past few years as power generators switched to cheaper natural gas, and steelmakers slashed production amid low prices and foreign competition. Steelmakers also face an economic slump that has helped send two of the three major steelmakers on the Canadian side of the Great Lakes into creditor protection.

Shipments of coal and iron ore fell by 32 per cent and 25 per cent, respectively, between 2010 and 2015.

"Certainly coal is not being exported to the same degree. Iron ore as well," said Frank Vannelli, a senior vice-president at Montreal-based Logistec Corp., a company that provides cargo handling and stevedoring services at 28 ports along the Seaway, Atlantic Coast and Gulf of Mexico.

Shipping lines and the railways have all felt the sting of the drop in commodity volumes.

Several ocean-going carriers have formed alliances and pooled fleets to cut costs, while others have sought protection from creditors, unable to pay the costs of maintaining unwanted ships.

Total cargo tonnage on the Seaway is down by more than 4 per cent this year, according to the latest figures from the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corp., led by a 13-per-cent drop in grain and an 18-per-cent decline in general cargo.

But Logistec, which handled the concrete turbine tower load in June, has seen a rise in shipments of project cargo – offshore oil and gas drill pipes destined for Atlantic Canada, hydroelectric transformers and machinery for cement plants.

"There was a time when a lot of these projects were put on hold.

"Now they've kicked in," Mr. Vannelli said by phone.

In May, Siemens Canada shipped massive wind turbine blades made at its plant in Tillsonburg, Ont., to Europe from the Port of Hamilton.

The concrete turbine towers were made at Enercon Canada Inc.'s now-closed factory at Port Weller, Ont.

Using a vessel to move the pieces to Sheet Harbour, N.S., from Port Weller took 100 trucks off the road, aiding highway congestion while reducing the job's carbon footprint, Mr. Vannelli said.

Emmanuelle Zagaria, who is in charge of shipping for Enercon, said the unusually long voyage and size of the shipment made it a challenge – it was too big to move by train, and typical rates for vessels are unaffordable in the low-margin wind-generation business.

However, the decline in global shipping volumes has led to a decline in shipping rates, and Ms. Zagaria was able to cut a deal with Logistec that saved her 10 per cent off the trucking fee.

"We usually go trucking; that's our main way of hauling. But we were open to any other way of transporting. The wind market is becoming more and more competitive and we have to be more and more clever. Basically what happened is I met with Logistec and to be honest with you, we pressured them a lot to be able to do it [at a lower price]," Ms. Zagaria said, declining to elaborate.