Posted on October 28, 2024
DUBUQUE, Iowa – Low Mississippi River levels are limiting how much cargo barges can carry as farmers look to ship their harvested crops, cutting profits.
According to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Mississippi River is several feet lower than normal for this time of year in Dubuque.
Logistics Park Dubuque loads grain, fertilizer, and other bulk commodities onto barges. General Manager Joe Bitter said as water levels run lower, barges “run into more of a risk hitting ground.”
“When there’s plenty of water in the river system, we’ll load a barge nine and a half feet deep,” said Bitter. “As the river starts to empty out, river levels get lower, we’ll gradually have to creep that down to about a nine-foot level. There’s variability of about six inches, which doesn’t sound like a lot but in barge terms that’s a lot of product.”
Profit margins are affected if the carrying capacity of barges is compromised, according to former U.S. Army Corps of Engineers River Captain and author Lee Hendrix. He also noted more trips for freighters to ship harvested crops.
“Now you’re having to spread that out over maybe two towboats,” said Hendrix. “You have to crew another boat. It just adds to the expenses, makes the rates go up, which affects everyone up and down the line, particularly the farmers and the shippers.”
Bitter said increased costs are eventually passed to consumers.
“Not in the moment, but certainly as operating costs go up, as shipping costs go up, someone’s got to pay that bill,” explained Bitter.
Passing increased costs to consumers could also mean losing business.
“In a lot of instances, the consumers are in another county,” said Hendrix. “So rather than take that grain from the United States, they might take it from someplace else.”
When water levels are too low along the Mississippi River, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers pulls material out of the river to make room for barges to pass through safely. It’s a process called dredging.
“We have a crew that’s gone back and forth,” said Tim Koehn, Lock & Dam #11 Lockmaster. “They’ll have to go up there, dredge them out to make sure the channel is wide enough to get traffic moving, passing back and forth.”
Dredging also shuts down the river, delaying deliveries and increasing operating costs further for freighters.
