China Quartz Tariff List May Expand

WASHINGTON – Cambria Company LLC is asking federal regulators to widen the field of Chinese-made hard surfaces subject to unfair-trade tariffs.

In a Feb. 14 request to the U.S. Commerce Department, the Eden Prairie, Minn.-based quartz-surface manufacturer seeks to include what it calls “quartz glass” products in the proposed antidumping/countervailing list.

The company stated a new class of hard-surface products, substituting fine-grained glass powder for quartz sand, is being offered to U.S. buyers in an attempt to circumvent the preliminary combined tariffs, which could total more than 300% of declared customs value.

Cambria initially sought to include slabs with a “predominantly silica” mixture of materials solidified by a resin binder in its initial unfair-trade petition to the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) last April.

However, the USITC noted that definition would include products using recycled crushed glass as part of a eco-friendly material (such as U.S.-made products like Vetrazzo and IceStone). The scope of the petition changed to consider predominantly quartz mixtures.

“It was never intended to exclude quartz surface products made from ground glass powder that are virtually indistinguishable in appearance from other quartz surface products,” noted Cambria’s request.

The company cited several examples of the quartz glass product being offered to U.S. buyers, although details were redacted from public documents as proprietary business information

Cambria asked the Commerce Department to tighten the definition for glass products being excluded from the new tariffs, so the crushed-glass content is the heaviest part of the hard-surface mixture, and that pieces of glass larger than 1cm be visible on a slab’s surface. Also, the distance between any single piece of visible glass and the closest separate glass piece would not exceed 3”.

Cambria’s request drew a quick response from at least one company opposing the new tariffs. Attorneys representing CQ International Ltd. complained that the redacted information, including sales letters from Chinese companies, should be public, and that Cambria is “overclaiming” that it’s proprietary to its business.

CQ International asked the Commerce Department to reject Cambria’s claim.

The Commerce Department will issue a final ruling this spring on the unfair-trade tariffs.