The Pennsylvania Steel Products Procurement Act requires that every contract for a public works project in Pennsylvania use steel products made in the United States. The rule reaches every level of state and local government, covers mixed-origin products only if at least 75% of their cost is domestic, and backs itself up with recovery of improper payments and a five-year debarment for willful violations.
What the Act Requires
Every public works contract in Pennsylvania must include a clause requiring the use of U.S.-produced steel. “Steel products” is defined broadly: anything rolled, formed, shaped, drawn, extruded, forged, cast, or fabricated from steel made in the U.S. by the open hearth, basic oxygen, electric furnace, Bessemer, or other steelmaking process. Cast iron products are included.1Pennsylvania General Assembly. Steel Products Procurement Act, Consolidated Text
Since 1984, the definition also sweeps in machinery and equipment classified under U.S. Department of Commerce Standard Industrial Classification codes 25 (furniture and fixtures), 35 (machinery, except electrical), and 37 (transportation equipment), so long as the items are made of, fabricated from, or contain steel components. Door hardware was carved out by a 2013 amendment.2Allegion. Pennsylvania Steel Act
Who and What Is Covered
“Public agency” is defined to cover the Commonwealth and all its departments, boards, commissions, and agencies; counties, cities, boroughs, townships, and school districts; the State Public School Building Authority and the State Highway and Bridge Authority; all municipal and school authorities; and any other public body, authority, or instrumentality, whether governmental or proprietary.3Pennsylvania Legislative Reference Bureau. Steel Products Procurement Act, Act 1978-3 Full Text In practice, that means PennDOT highway work, a school district renovation, a municipal authority sewer project, and a township bridge repair are all in.
“Public works” is equally broad: any structure, building, highway, waterway, street, bridge, transit system, airport, or other improvement, whether permanent or temporary and whether for governmental or proprietary use. A 1984 amendment made the transit coverage explicit, naming railways, street railways, subways, elevated and monorail passenger cars, locomotives, passenger buses, electrification equipment, rails, tracks, roadbeds, guideways, elevated structures, stations, terminals, docks, and shelters.1Pennsylvania General Assembly. Steel Products Procurement Act, Consolidated Text
The 75% Domestic Cost Rule
Products that mix foreign and domestic steel are not automatically disqualified. A product qualifies as a “United States steel product” if at least 75% of the cost of the articles, materials, and supplies incorporated into it were mined, produced, or manufactured in the United States.1Pennsylvania General Assembly. Steel Products Procurement Act, Consolidated Text
How to run that calculation was unsettled until the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decided United Blower, Inc. v. Lycoming County Water and Sewer Authority on September 22, 2021. The case grew out of air blowers installed at a Montoursville sewage treatment plant; the authority alleged the units contained enough foreign steel to breach the 75% threshold and sought roughly $243,000 in penalties.4Engineering News-Record. Contractors Must Pay for Using Foreign Steel Components, Court Rules
Writing for the majority, Justice Wecht held two things that tightened the rule considerably. First, the full acquisition price paid by the manufacturer for foreign steel components counts as foreign cost, with no deduction for domestic overhead such as shipping, warehousing, or logistics. The statute, the court said, provides no mechanism to winnow domestic value out of the cost of foreign materials. Second, the denominator is not the price the public agency paid the contractor. It is the manufacturer’s own cost of all the steel used, measured against the manufacturer’s cost of the foreign steel used.5Justia. United Blower, Inc. v. Lycoming County Water and Sewer Authority
For contractors, that means thinner margins on the 75% test and a documentation burden that runs back up the supply chain. Manufacturers must be able to substantiate what they paid for every steel component and where that component originated, and contractors are advised to line up those records with upstream suppliers at the start of a project rather than at closeout.
Exemptions: The Two Ways Out
There are only two routes around the domestic steel requirement. The first is a written determination by the head of the public agency that the required steel products are not produced in the United States in quantities sufficient to meet the contract. The second is placement of the product on the Department of General Services annual exemption list.1Pennsylvania General Assembly. Steel Products Procurement Act, Consolidated Text
The DGS list runs on a yearly cycle. At the start of each calendar year, DGS reviews the ST-4 waivers it approved during the prior year and uses them to identify items for the new list. A proposed list is published in the Pennsylvania Bulletin for 30 days of public comment, then finalized on the DGS website. Once published, the list is fixed for that year.6Pennsylvania Department of General Services. Steel Products Procurement Act A fabricator or manufacturer who believes an item on the proposed list is now available domestically can ask DGS to remove it by submitting a Steel Origin Certification Form to the Deputy Secretary for Capital Programs.
Items move on and off the list as domestic capacity shifts. The 2025 list, for instance, identified butterfly valves, check valves, and flanged cast iron gate valves as no longer exempt, meaning those items are again subject to the Act.7Pennsylvania Department of General Services. 2025 List of Exempt Machinery and Equipment Steel Products Checking the current year’s list before ordering is the only safe practice.
Compliance Documentation
On PennDOT projects, compliance is demonstrated through a defined set of forms and markings. The core documents are:
- Form CS-4171, the Certificate of Compliance required for all steel products, covering identifiable steel, steel with in-plant inspection, and unidentified steel.
- Form CS-4171S, a supplemental certification for products that contain some foreign steel, used to document that the product still meets the 75% domestic cost threshold.
- Identifiable steel bearing the Department-approved permanent marking “MM-USA.” A manufacturer must have written PennDOT approval before applying it.
- Unidentified steel, which must travel with invoices, bills of lading, and mill test reports that positively identify it as melted and manufactured in the United States.
On DGS-administered projects, the ST-4 form is used to request an exemption for specific machinery or equipment.6Pennsylvania Department of General Services. Steel Products Procurement Act8PennDOT. Pennsylvania Steel Products Procurement Act & FHWA Buy America
Penalties for Noncompliance
Two consequences follow a violation. First, any payment made to a contractor, subcontractor, manufacturer, or supplier that should not have been made because of noncompliance is recoverable. The public agency can sue, and so can the Attorney General, in the court of common pleas.1Pennsylvania General Assembly. Steel Products Procurement Act, Consolidated Text
Second, a willful violation triggers a five-year debarment. The violator cannot submit bids on any public agency contract for five years. If the violator is a subcontractor, manufacturer, or supplier, the ban also prohibits performing any work or furnishing any materials on public agency projects during that period. An agency’s determination that a violation occurred is reviewable under Pennsylvania’s administrative procedure laws.
When Federal Buy America Also Applies
On federally funded highway projects, a Pennsylvania contractor must satisfy both the state Steel Act and the federal Buy America provisions in 23 U.S.C. ยง 313 and 23 CFR 635.410. The two regimes overlap, but they are not the same, and the stricter standard controls on any given point.8PennDOT. Pennsylvania Steel Products Procurement Act & FHWA Buy America
- Scope. The state Act applies to every public works project in Pennsylvania, no matter the funding source. Federal Buy America applies to highway projects financed with federal funds, and to projects eligible for FHWA assistance under Title 23 NEPA even when federal funds are not actually used.
- Foreign steel tolerance. The state Act allows a product to qualify when 75% of its cost is domestic. Federal Buy America is far tighter: foreign steel or iron is permitted only if its cost does not exceed the greater of 0.1% of the contract amount or $2,500.
- Coatings. Federal Buy America requires that coatings on steel or iron be applied in the United States. The state Act has no comparable coating requirement.
- Waivers. State Act waivers come from the head of the relevant public agency, or from the Secretary of Transportation on PennDOT projects. Federal waivers come from FHWA and are project-specific and non-transferable.
States may impose rules that match or exceed federal Buy America, but not rules that are weaker on federally funded work.9FHWA. Buy America General Q&A For federally funded PennDOT contracts, the CS-4171 and CS-4171S forms are built to address both regimes at once, and a contractor who clears the stricter test on each item will satisfy both.