AD/CVD Petitioner Takes to CIT Against Scope Ruling on Glycine
The Commerce Department's finding that calcium glycinate is outside the scope of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on glycine from India, Japan, Thailand and China was not backed by substantial evidence, AD/CVD petitioner GEO Specialty Chemicals argued in a Dec. 7 complaint at the Court of International Trade (GEO Specialty Chemicals v. United States, CIT # 23-00238).
GEO said it filed its scope ruling request in August 2023, explaining that calcium glycinate stems from the "chelation of calcium and glycine," though glycine "can easily be retrieved from calcium glycinate 'when the product is deconstructed.'" In particular, GEO said that wet glycine can be retrieved from calcium glycinate via a "simple chemical reaction with sulfuric acid, and then the glycine slurry is dried to form dried crystalline glycine."
As a result, calcium glycinate is a subject good since the orders' scope language said subject merchandise includes "glycine and precursors of dried crystalline glycine that are processed in a third country."
In response, Commerce said calcium glycinate is an input used to make glycine slurry, adding that glycine slurry is a precursor of dried crystallines glycine. The petitioner brought the three-count complaint in response. GEO said the orders' scope doesn't define the term "precursor," arguing that the scope language "is not dispositive as to the issue of whether calcium glycinate is a precursor of dried crystalline glycine." Despite the ambiguity, Commerce said that clacium glycinate isn't a dried crystalline glycine precursor without looking to the (k)(1) or (k)(2) factors, the complaint said.
Commerce also erred since the scope ruling "directly conflicts with its previous scope rulings pertaining to the Orders at issue and other orders with same or similar language as the Orders at issue, including but not limited to Commerce’s scope ruling on sodium glycinate in the antidumping duty order on Glycine from China," the brief said.