On August 30, 2013, the US Court of International Trade held that small diameter graphite electrodes manufactured by UK Carbon & Graphite, Ltd (UKCG) in the UK from Chinese rod are products of China for purposes of US antidumping law.

This is contrary to rulings by UK authorities, which found them to be of UK origin.

This case did not involve electrodes over 16 inches (406.4mm) in diameter. The appeal was due to a conflict between the law in the UK (and EU) and how the law is being interpreted in the United States.

UKCG had argued that rods had been excluded from the anti-dumping case, and that the US Commerce Department had made various errors in calculating the value added in the UK, including refusing to use actual costs of UKCG but rather using ‘surrogate’ costs.

Unfortunately, the US Court of International Trade ruled that the Commerce Department has broad discretion to make its decision and that the Court would not go into the details of the agency decision. As a result, the small diameter graphite electrodes must be declared to be products of the UK for the purpose of country of origin in the United States and in other countries (or be in violation of UK and US origin rulings), but also must be declared as Chinese for the purpose of the US dumping case.

The case will not result in UKCG having to pay any additional duties or penalties but will result in UKCG having to declare certain products as subject to the US dumping order if it were to import these products into the USA.

While UKCG believes that this conflict in laws should have been resolved differently, UKCG's success with its business model will not be affected because the United States government has made clear that other products (including any over 16 inches in diameter and any produced from non-Chinese rods) are not subject to the dumping order. Thus, UKCG will continue to serve its customers as it has in the past.