2021 forecast for Maine's marine industries: Shipyards will continue to grow

Photo / Courtesy BIW The USS Daniel Inouye, built at BIW

Write a Comment

By Mainebiz Staff

Maine’s two largest shipyards continue to grow and evolve.

Bath Iron Works recently started sea trials on the future USS Daniel Inouye (DDG 118), the first destroyer built at the shipyard to head down the Kennebec River in two years.

BIW is owned by General Dynamics Corp. (NYSE: GD), a Reston, Va.-based defense contractor. BIW employs 6,500 people and plans to accelerate hiring in 2021, with a projected goal of bringing on another 2,650 workers as part of its goal to increase the rate of shipbuilding to two ships a year.

The USS Daniel Inouye is a 510-foot-long, Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer, named for the late U.S. senator from Hawaii.

BIW’s last sea trials for an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer were in March 2018, and the ship was delivered to the Navy about three months later. BIW has built over 30 of the destroyers since launching the first one in 1989.

While figures are not available on the cost of building individual vessels, the future Daniel Inouye is part of a $3.9 billion Navy contract awarded to BIW in September 2018.

Next up for the Bath shipyard is the future USS William Charette (DDG 130), with four more under contact after that.

Shipyard’s plans will bolster Kittery housing stock

Further south, in Kittery, the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, which had 7,310 civilian employees in 2019, has seen a steady increase in civilian employment in recent years. It is one of four Navy facilities and is primarily responsible for maintenance of Navy ships.

The shipyard has invested in a land-use study looking at ways to reduce traffic and increase affordable housing.

In the coming year, the facility will continue to invest in its infrastructure.

In September 2019, a New Hampshire company, Methuen Construction Co., was hired for a $59 million job to build a new facility that would consolidate the yard’s paint, blast, rubber manufacturing and plastic molding operations into one location. The job is expected to be completed by September 2023.

A proposal by a private investor could benefit the shipyard’s burgeoning workforce. Aztek LLC of Kennebunkport plans a $59 million, nine-building mixed-use complex that would include 300 apartments in Kittery. The project could open by late 2022, and create much needed housing.