Description: German company's challenge to the Department of Commerce's determinations that German government regulatory programs provided countervailing subsidies to steel company.
-
BGH Edelstahl Siegen GmbH v. United States
Case Documents:
Filing Date Type File Action Taken Summary 10/12/2022 Opinion and Order Download Department of Commerce's final determinations in countervailing duty investigation sustained in part and remanded in part. Court of International Trade Largely Upheld Determination that German Programs Constituted Countervailable Subsidies to Steel Company. In a German steel company’s challenge to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s determinations that German government regulatory programs provided countervailable subsidies to the company, the Court of International Trade upheld the determinations with respect to exemptions from certain electricity and energy taxes, reductions in surcharges intended to distribute the costs of promoting renewable energy sources, allocations of additional free allowances for carbon emissions under the European Union’s Emissions Trading System, and compensation for higher energy costs under Germany’s CO2 Compensation Program. For each of these programs, the court found that the program provided a financial contribution, that the program conferred a benefit on the German company, and that the subsidies were limited to a sufficiently small number of enterprises to be “specific” subsidies. With respect to the exemptions from electricity and energy taxes, the court rejected the company’s contention that Commerce should have considered the relative burdens on German manufacturers due to the U.S.’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accords, finding that neither Commerce nor the court was “at liberty to evaluate the environmental rationale” of the German measures or to compare them with U.S. measures. With respect to a program that provided exemptions from concession fees paid for laying and operation of gas and power lines on public transport routes, the court found that additional explanation or reconsideration was required with respect to the determination that program was a specific subsidy. 03/22/2022 Response Download Rebuttal brief filed by defendant intervenors in opposition to motion for judgment. 10/26/2021 Motion Download Memorandum filed by plaintiff in support of motion for judgment upon the agency record.