BRC Attorneys Successfully Challenge Scope of AD Order

October 1, 2010

BRC won a challenge in the US Court of International Trade (King Supply Co v. United States, Slip Op 10-111), reversing a Commerce Department decision that certain imported pipe fittings for structural use fall within the scope of an antidumping order against certain carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings from China.  The scope of the underlying order expressly stated that  subject pipe fittings  are used in piping systems.  Our client argued to Commerce that, because its imports are used in structural applications, not piping systems, they are not within the scope of the order.  Commerce concluded that the language of the order does not contain an end-use exclusion , implying that the order applies to all pipe fittings regardless of end use. Commerce then concluded that, because the pipe fittings imported by our client had physical characteristics identical to the characteristics described in the scope of the order, the pipe fittings were covered by the order.

On appeal, the CIT agreed with BRC’s arguments that the order does, in fact, contain an exclusive end-use requirement, specifying unambiguously that  subject pipe fittings are used in piping systems.  Noting that our client had established that the record demonstrates that there are two uses for carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings -- in piping systems and in structural applications -- the court concluded that pipe fittings imported from China for use in structural applications, such as the pipe fittings imported by our client, were not covered by the order. Therefore, the court ordered Commerce to exclude carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings used for structural applications from the scope of the antidumping order.