Port of Charleston South Carolina’s Port of Charleston was cited this week as one of the main reasons replacement tire importer TBC Corp. chose a site near Summerville for a 1.1 million–sq.–ft. distribution center, becoming the fourth largest customer for the port. The Berkeley County site is near the Interstate 26/Jedburg Road interchange. TBC will serve as an anchor tenant for the planned distribution park in Jedburg. Completion of the building is expected by the end of 2010. After opening for operations, TBC should generate about 100 new jobs.

TBC Corp. distributes imported and domestic tires throughout the Southeast.

Meanwhile, South Carolina’s second major port, still under development, is suffering a few annoying setbacks. The proposed Jasper Ocean Terminal on the Savannah River in Jasper County needs dredging along the Savannah River to a distance maybe 20 miles out to sea, out where the ocean’s depth can already handle the big ships. The current proposal will deepen into the ocean only about four miles beyond the end of the existing channel.

The big ships are called Panamax class because the Panama Canal is also getting dredged and deepened while a new set of locks is being built. Today a container cargo ship can get through the Panama Canal with no more than 4,500 shipping containers. In about five years, upon the completion of the locks, a ship carrying 14,000 con- tainers will get through and head for Charleston and Savannah.

To handle the new size, the ports are going through new accommodations, including deeper water.

The Georgia Ports Authority has already spent $40 million over the past dozen years pursuing a permit to deepen the Savannah River to 48 feet (from 42 feet) all the 22 miles from the ocean to the Garden City Terminal. South Carolina’s Jasper Ocean Terminal is only eight miles from the ocean.

Altogether the Savannah River deepening project is expected to cost $540 million, according to the Georgia Ports Authority. The harbor pilots in Charleston, however, question that number when dredging 20 miles into the ocean is counted.

S.C. Sen. Hugh Leatherman, R–Florence, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, last July suggested S.C. should work to ensure Georgia doesn’t get the dredging permit, putting the Port of Charleston at a great advantage. The problem comes when S.C.’s Jasper Ocean Terminal is considered because it is not viable without the deepened Savannah River.

The Port of Charleston is pretty well set already at 45 feet deep, and the necessary depth for the Panamax ships, 48 feet, is not too far off.

If the Savannah River is not deep enough for the Panamax ships, the $1 billion in capital to build the Jasper Ocean Terminal won’t materialize.

South Carolina has agreed to cover half the cost for the Savannah River deepening project up to the proposed Jasper Ocean Terminal site. And both ports authorities are in agreement over a joint–venture container terminal jointly operated.

But all that is at least five years away. For now, container volume at the Port of Charleston is down to levels of 10 years ago. Container volume fell over the past year by at least 19 percent. The main immediate goal for the Port of Charleston is to grow the business. There’s a strategic plan connected with business development at the port, but the plan won’t be made public unless it gains approval by the October board meeting.

Besides TBC Corp., the story improves. Boeing should announce its site selection for its second 787 Dreamliner assembly plant by the end of this year, and North Charleston is the front runner. BMW’s Greer plant is expanding to 200,000 vehicles a year, hiring another 700 workers. CT&T (see Briefs) could easily locate one of its assembly plants in S.C., either Upstate or Lowcountry.

And that’s all due to existing capacity at the existing Port of Charleston. The value of the dollar is likely to stay down, holding down the price of exported American– made goods and raising the value of manufacturing in South Carolina.

Manufacturing and import/ export may sound like the Old Economy, the stuff of Adam Smith. But it’s money, real money and lots of it.