Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Russia steel plant fire kills 6, production intact
I don't think this article (or headline) will win any sensitivity awards.
An extensive fire at Russia's largest standalone steel plant, Magnitogorsk or MMK , killed six people, the emergency ministry said on Wednesday. Production was not affected.
An extensive fire at Russia's largest standalone steel plant, Magnitogorsk or MMK , killed six people, the emergency ministry said on Wednesday. Production was not affected.
Monday, November 20, 2006
T.T.C. Introduces New "Fraud Proof" Tokens
You may remember that, earlier this year, police broke up a TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) token forging ring. See my articles at the time here and here.
Two years before, there was another ring broken up. See my postings at the time.
Today the TTC announced new, harder to forge tokens.
citynews.ca
The new tokens, which will be dual-coloured to make them more difficult to reproduce, also have a special fraud-foiler inside them. But that's all transit brass will reveal about the concealed crime stopper.
'They have a milled edge and there is a secret device implanted in them that will give them away if someone tries to use one,' admits T.T.C. Chair Howard Moscoe. He refuses to say what kind of technology is being employed but hopes it will last a while.
'As careful as we are and as good as we are, you can never absolutely eliminate forgeries,' he concedes.
Two years before, there was another ring broken up. See my postings at the time.
Today the TTC announced new, harder to forge tokens.
citynews.ca
The new tokens, which will be dual-coloured to make them more difficult to reproduce, also have a special fraud-foiler inside them. But that's all transit brass will reveal about the concealed crime stopper.
'They have a milled edge and there is a secret device implanted in them that will give them away if someone tries to use one,' admits T.T.C. Chair Howard Moscoe. He refuses to say what kind of technology is being employed but hopes it will last a while.
'As careful as we are and as good as we are, you can never absolutely eliminate forgeries,' he concedes.
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Striking AK Steel workers find hard way to go
You know, we've been following this situation since it started, at least partly because some union members found this site and commented on it.
I found this interesting, especially some of the numbers near the end.
Cincinnati Enquirer
Allen retired in October, seven months after workers were locked out on Feb. 28. For him, and about 2,500 AK workers, it's been a rough road.
'I haven't done much of anything for nine months. I tried to sell cars for awhile, but that didn't work out.'
His savings are burning up like coke in a blast furnace. As a single man, he collected $343 a week in strike benefits. Before the lockout, he earned $57,000 a year - three times as much.
So why would someone throw away a perfectly good job?
That's asked a lot in Middletown, where AK Steel is the 'company' in 'company town.'
Allen knows his hometown is suffering. 'I think they are getting fed up with hearing people talk about it. They say, 'You guys are making all kinds of money. Why don't you go ahead and take it?' But if we do take it, what do we do in six years if they do it to us again?'
AK's 'final offer' would take away seniority, make AK workers and retirees pay a share of health insurance and would not guarantee how many hours they can get, Allen said. He reckons that would cost him $5,000 a year. And he could be moved to bottom-rung work - like the blast furnace.
'It's a total screwed-up mess. You wouldn't want to go to work.'
Union workers say AK wanted a showdown.
AK Vice President Alan McCoy says, 'The union doesn't comprehend that the world and the steel industry have changed drastically, and Middletown has not.'
Bethlehem Steel and other U.S. steel companies declared bankruptcy to shed retiree costs, he explained. AK did not. "Their pension and retiree legacy is zero. Ours is $2.2 billion. In cost per ton, that can add up to $50 more than our competitors."
And AK's contract protects 650 job classifications. "It's the last of the old line contracts," McCoy said. Unions at other AK plants have cut job classifications to five or seven. "They get it," McCoy said. "You can't compete with U.S. companies, much less China, with 650 job classifications."
And like the auto companies that buy half of AK orders, AK wants workers and retirees to pay a share of health care.
Allen says AK picked a fight and the union can't back down.
"When we voted down that last contract, they came back with one that just made it worse. Why are they giving us such a hard way to go?"
The answer is in the numbers. The year before the lockout, AK lost $29 million. With temporary workers, it earned $26 million in the same quarter this year.
I found this interesting, especially some of the numbers near the end.
Cincinnati Enquirer
Allen retired in October, seven months after workers were locked out on Feb. 28. For him, and about 2,500 AK workers, it's been a rough road.
'I haven't done much of anything for nine months. I tried to sell cars for awhile, but that didn't work out.'
His savings are burning up like coke in a blast furnace. As a single man, he collected $343 a week in strike benefits. Before the lockout, he earned $57,000 a year - three times as much.
So why would someone throw away a perfectly good job?
That's asked a lot in Middletown, where AK Steel is the 'company' in 'company town.'
Allen knows his hometown is suffering. 'I think they are getting fed up with hearing people talk about it. They say, 'You guys are making all kinds of money. Why don't you go ahead and take it?' But if we do take it, what do we do in six years if they do it to us again?'
AK's 'final offer' would take away seniority, make AK workers and retirees pay a share of health insurance and would not guarantee how many hours they can get, Allen said. He reckons that would cost him $5,000 a year. And he could be moved to bottom-rung work - like the blast furnace.
'It's a total screwed-up mess. You wouldn't want to go to work.'
Union workers say AK wanted a showdown.
AK Vice President Alan McCoy says, 'The union doesn't comprehend that the world and the steel industry have changed drastically, and Middletown has not.'
Bethlehem Steel and other U.S. steel companies declared bankruptcy to shed retiree costs, he explained. AK did not. "Their pension and retiree legacy is zero. Ours is $2.2 billion. In cost per ton, that can add up to $50 more than our competitors."
And AK's contract protects 650 job classifications. "It's the last of the old line contracts," McCoy said. Unions at other AK plants have cut job classifications to five or seven. "They get it," McCoy said. "You can't compete with U.S. companies, much less China, with 650 job classifications."
And like the auto companies that buy half of AK orders, AK wants workers and retirees to pay a share of health care.
Allen says AK picked a fight and the union can't back down.
"When we voted down that last contract, they came back with one that just made it worse. Why are they giving us such a hard way to go?"
The answer is in the numbers. The year before the lockout, AK lost $29 million. With temporary workers, it earned $26 million in the same quarter this year.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Sale of Canadian steel group Dofasco hits obstacle
Yahoo! News
A plan by Arcelor Mittal to sell Canadian steel producer Dofasco to ThyssenKrupp of Germany has hit a stumbling block, the world's biggest steel group has said.
Seems there's a poison pill in place.
A plan by Arcelor Mittal to sell Canadian steel producer Dofasco to ThyssenKrupp of Germany has hit a stumbling block, the world's biggest steel group has said.
Seems there's a poison pill in place.
Labels: Dofasco
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Steel firms gain clout thanks to consolidation
This is great for steel companies, not so great for steel consumers ...
It's an interesting article. No earth shattering information but it is being published in a newspaper for normal people, not a trade journal, so that's good.
www.cleveland.com
Before the steel industry's recent consolidation, it had one big problem.
It couldn't stop making steel.
When times got tough and steel prices dipped below profitable margins, steel makers kept churning out coils at high volume, like an assembly line stuck on 'go.'
It's an interesting article. No earth shattering information but it is being published in a newspaper for normal people, not a trade journal, so that's good.
www.cleveland.com
Before the steel industry's recent consolidation, it had one big problem.
It couldn't stop making steel.
When times got tough and steel prices dipped below profitable margins, steel makers kept churning out coils at high volume, like an assembly line stuck on 'go.'
Lakshmi Mittal tightens grip on Arcelor Mittal steel group
It isn't clear to me what, if any significance, this will have for customers of the worlds largest steel company. But there's an old expression, if the elephant sneezes, the mouse catches a cold.
Yahoo! News
Lakshmi Mittal has been named chief executive officer of the steel giant Arcelor Mittal, putting him clearly in control but calling into question what was termed a merger of equals when the group was created four months ago.
Yahoo! News
Lakshmi Mittal has been named chief executive officer of the steel giant Arcelor Mittal, putting him clearly in control but calling into question what was termed a merger of equals when the group was created four months ago.
Sunday, November 05, 2006
Thieves Take 9,000 Feet Of Copper Wire From National Grid
I see these stories from time to time. They're really peripheral to metal stamping, so mostly I ignore them. But they do illustrate how expensive copper has become, and there seems to be a spate of them this weekend, so I thought I'd do a little round-up.
Syracuse Police are trying to figure out who stole 9,000 feet of copper wire from an underground conduit that runs from West Kirkpatrick Street to Hiawatha Boulevard. A National Grid employee told police the person or people who did it, has some knowledge of wiring.
David Hess, a National Grid employee, told police that sometime between October 27 and November 2, someone took the wire. Hess told police National Grid only learned about the theft when contractors went to install street lights.
The copper wire is valued at one dollar per foot, making the value of the entire theft $9,000.
Pole toppled in copper-theft try
Police said they foiled a copper theft early yesterday after a 47-year-old Honolulu man chopped down a utility pole and attempted to rip wire from a transformer
Since May, copper thieves have caused an estimated $300,000 in damage to state freeways along the central and west O'ahu corridor
Pittsburgh Man Arrested In Copper Wire Thefts
And just to show how much the change in economics is changing everything else surrounding it,
Former Oneida Limited Knife Plant To Make Copper Wire, 50 New Jobs
A company with several facilities already in Central New York will turn the former Oneida Limited knife plant in Kenwood into a copper wire manufacturing plant.
Mining firms in fight over mill
Two mining companies are battling over a massive shuttered copper mill near Tucson that holds the key to development plans for both.
The mill is central to a $128 million planned expansion of Mercator Minerals' Mineral Park copper mine near Kingman and to increased production at Asarco's Mission mine in Sahuarita, 18 miles south of Tucson.
Both companies claim ownership of the 30-year-old mill and have asked the courts to decide who gets to keep the hulking steel-and-iron plant.
Toronto-based Mercator Minerals Ltd. has a sales receipt, but Tucson's Asarco LLC has the mill, which is mothballed on its Mission property.
All this, mind you, on one day. A Sunday, at that!
Syracuse Police are trying to figure out who stole 9,000 feet of copper wire from an underground conduit that runs from West Kirkpatrick Street to Hiawatha Boulevard. A National Grid employee told police the person or people who did it, has some knowledge of wiring.
David Hess, a National Grid employee, told police that sometime between October 27 and November 2, someone took the wire. Hess told police National Grid only learned about the theft when contractors went to install street lights.
The copper wire is valued at one dollar per foot, making the value of the entire theft $9,000.
Pole toppled in copper-theft try
Police said they foiled a copper theft early yesterday after a 47-year-old Honolulu man chopped down a utility pole and attempted to rip wire from a transformer
Since May, copper thieves have caused an estimated $300,000 in damage to state freeways along the central and west O'ahu corridor
Pittsburgh Man Arrested In Copper Wire Thefts
And just to show how much the change in economics is changing everything else surrounding it,
Former Oneida Limited Knife Plant To Make Copper Wire, 50 New Jobs
A company with several facilities already in Central New York will turn the former Oneida Limited knife plant in Kenwood into a copper wire manufacturing plant.
Mining firms in fight over mill
Two mining companies are battling over a massive shuttered copper mill near Tucson that holds the key to development plans for both.
The mill is central to a $128 million planned expansion of Mercator Minerals' Mineral Park copper mine near Kingman and to increased production at Asarco's Mission mine in Sahuarita, 18 miles south of Tucson.
Both companies claim ownership of the 30-year-old mill and have asked the courts to decide who gets to keep the hulking steel-and-iron plant.
Toronto-based Mercator Minerals Ltd. has a sales receipt, but Tucson's Asarco LLC has the mill, which is mothballed on its Mission property.
All this, mind you, on one day. A Sunday, at that!
Labels: Copper
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
China to produce 460 mln tons crude steel in 2007 - CISA
Interfax
China's crude steel production will increase around 11% [...] in 2007, the China Iron
and Steel Association (CISA) said.
The CISA says 2006 crude steel production will rise 16.6% [...] based on production statistics from the first nine months, new operations in the second half and market demand
China's crude steel production will increase around 11% [...] in 2007, the China Iron
and Steel Association (CISA) said.
The CISA says 2006 crude steel production will rise 16.6% [...] based on production statistics from the first nine months, new operations in the second half and market demand
STAINLESS STEEL PRICES AT RECORD HIGHS - MORE RISES IMMINENT
This is certainly not good news. Many stampers have locked in contractual prices, and rising input costs are bad news.
MEPS STEEL NEWS
Stainless steel prices have reached record levels, and look set to advance still further in the next few months. Including raw material surcharges, MEPS transaction prices for cold rolled 304 in Europe and North America now exceed $US4,500 per tonne – an unprecedented high value.
MEPS STEEL NEWS
Stainless steel prices have reached record levels, and look set to advance still further in the next few months. Including raw material surcharges, MEPS transaction prices for cold rolled 304 in Europe and North America now exceed $US4,500 per tonne – an unprecedented high value.
