Tag Archives: Business

The good and the bad.

NEVADA MINING

Posted on by
Reply
Pin It

MINING-BIG BUSINESS IN NEVADA

By Chet Yarbrough

Nevada mining makes an outsized contribution to the State’s economy.  Tourism, gaming, mining, and ranching are Nevada’s “big four” industry groups.   According to nevadaworkforce.com, Nevada’s mining industry increased employment by 12.2% between Q2-2011 and Q2-2012, the largest percentage gain in any of Nevada’s four main industries.

Over 15,000 people are directly or indirectly employed in the Nevada mining industry.  Average annual wages are estimated at $88,000. NMA estimates Nevada taxes collected on worker contributions, and mining industry sales are near $417 million in 2011.  (Their calculation is based on a combination of state, county, and federal taxes.)

MICHAEL DOYLE - EXECUTIVE VP, OPERATIONS OF AMERICAN VANDIUM CORPORATION

MICHAEL DOYLE - EXECUTIVE VP, OPERATIONS OF AMERICAN VANDIUM CORPORATION

American Vanadium Corp. plans to develop the Gibellini Mine Project in Nevada, the only vanadium mine operation in the United States.    Michael Doyle, Executive Vice President of Operations in Sparks, Nevada said, “The projected life of the mine is 7 years with significant additional resources currently being evaluated.”  In 2011, Bill Radvak, CEO of American Vanadium, said “We are in the permitting phase.”  In a best case projection, the mine would be open in late 2013.

The planned location for the mine is 25 miles south of Eureka, Nevada—off State Road 379, 325 miles north of Las Vegas and 346 miles east of Reno.  Though not near Nevada’s big cities, it will impact employment in the Eureka, Ely, and Elko communities.

GIBELLINI MINE PROJECT IN NEVADA

GIBELLINI MINE PROJECT IN NEVADA

American Vanadium estimates employment of 130 people at the time of peak development with operating personnel averaging 91 employees during mine operation.  Doyle said, “The initial capital investment is estimated at nearly $100,000,000 with infrastructure costs, including on site and offsite development for project access, material transport, water, sewer, and administrative office construction.”  The new mine will have wide impact on the entire state with purchase and/or lease of manufactured material and equipment for development and operation of the mine.  Estimated tax payments from operation of the mine are $12.3 million, excluding tax contribution from employee spending.

VANDIUM FLOW BATTERY SCHEMATIC

VANDIUM FLOW BATTERY SCHEMATIC

Vanadium, discovered in 1801, is a naturally occurring chemical element.  Its chemical characteristics give it wide use in industrial and medical industries.  Without knowing what uses will be made of vanadium from the Gibellini mine, it is interesting that American Vanadium recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Germany’s Gildemeister AG, a maker of vanadium redox flow rechargeable batteries.  A representative of American Vanadium explained, “Rechargeable batteries for electrical-storage offers renewable energy production and optimization of the nation’s energy grid.”  A successful demonstration of a vanadium redox flow battery was shown in the 1980s.  In these batteries, the energy is actually stored in the vanadium, which represents 40% of their cost.

GALVANIC ACTION DIAGRAM--PRINCIPLE OF VANADIUM BATTERY FUNCTION

GALVANIC ACTION DIAGRAM–PRINCIPLE OF VANADIUM BATTERY FUNCTION

American Vanadium Corp. will be a welcome addition to Nevada’s mining industry.  Gibellini mine production has the potential for creating ancillary businesses that may directly or indirectly benefit Nevada’s economy.

MOLYCORP MOUNTAIN PASS MINE

MOLYCORP MOUNTAIN PASS MINE

Not far from Nevada’s southwest border, about 100 miles from Las Vegas, Molycorp is planning to reinvest in a rare-earth mine.  There are 17 rare earth metals in the periodic table.  These rare earth metals are important chemical elements in everything from Mercury-vapor lamps to lasers that are used for both medical and industrial applications.  Ninety percent of these rare earth metals are produced in China where 65 percent of the metals are consumed.  Uses of rare metals vary from smartphones, electric car batteries to missiles and energy facilities.

Molycorp is a world-wide company with 26 locations in 11 countries.  It employs 2,700 people.  Molycorp mines 13 of the 17 rare earth metals.  It began mining for bastnasite, a rare earth ore, at Mountain Pass mine on the California/Nevada border in 1949.

Molycorp is planning to re-invest an estimated $532 million in the Mountain Pass Mine.  After a nine-year hiatus, the mine re-opened in 2011.  The rare earth metals sought in the reinvestment are Cerium, Lanthanum, and Yttrium (all found in basnasite).  Cerium is used in Carbon-Arc lights to illuminate movie sets and projector screens.  It is also an element in the petroleum refinement process.  Lanthanum is used in glass and camera lenses.  It is also used in X-ray films and different types of lasers.   Yttrium is used in microwave filters, laser systems, and alloys of chromium, aluminium (a chemical element in the boron group), or magnesium because of its strengthening qualities.

Mountain Pass is the only rare-earth-metals mine in America.  The reinvestment plan for the mine is to employ 200 people who will operate 3 shifts on a 24/7 basis.  Many of these employees will commute from Las Vegas.  Molycorp’s website shows they are presently looking for a Journeyman Plant Mechanic, Mine Operator, Plant Mechanic A, Plant Mechanic B, Journeyman Electrician, and Operator Trainee.  The molycorp.com website is a good place to learn about company careers, benefits, values, and history.

COMSTOCK LODE-Remains of the Combination Shaft, 2011. The Combination Shaft, located near Virginia City, began in 1875 when the mine owners combined their efforts to sink a shaft to explore the Comstock Lode at a greater depth. The Combination was the deepest shaft ever sunk on the Comstock, reaching a depth of 3,250 feet. It was used until 1886.

COMSTOCK LODE-Remains of the Combination Shaft, 2011. The Combination Shaft, located near Virginia City, began in 1875 when the mine owners combined their efforts to sink a shaft to explore the Comstock Lode at a greater depth. The Combination was the deepest shaft ever sunk on the Comstock, reaching a depth of 3,250 feet. It was used until 1886.

Nevada is a storied mining state.  The 1858 Comstock Lode opens silver mining in Nevada.  In the 1870s, gold is discovered in Eureka County but the low-grade deposits are too small to create much excitement; at least until 1961, when Newmont Mining Corporation moves into the Carlin area and begins producing gold from low-grade deposits.  In the late 1970s, when gold prices were deregulated, gold mining in Nevada boomed.  Newmont Mining Corporation continues major mining operations in Nevada.  They employ 40,000 people worldwide.   In 2011, 14 open-pit mines and 4 underground mines were operating in the Carlin area.  On March 8, 2013, Newmont’s website lists 38 job openings in Nevada.

By 2009, Nevada is producing 79% of all the gold in the United States.  In 2007, 6,037,000 ounces of gold were produced in Nevada.  The most prolific gold producing mine in Nevada is the Betze-Post Mine, owned and operated by Barrick Gold, the world’s leading gold producer.

BETZE-POST OPEN PIT MINE

BETZE-POST OPEN PIT MINE

The mine is operated by Barrick Goldstrike Mines, Inc.  It is located in the upper middle part of the State, 75 miles southwest of Elko.   They have 1503 full time employees, 200 contract employees, and produce 1,819,115 ounces of gold and 117,750 ounces of silver.  On March 8, 2013, Barrick Mines website lists 57 job openings in Nevada.

Another gold mining company in Nevada is Scorpio Gold Corporation that holds a 70% interest in the Mineral Ridge Gold Mine (Waterton Global Value L.P. owns the other 30%).  The Mineral Ridge Gold Mine is approximately 217 miles northeast of Las Vegas.  It is one of the smaller gold and silver mining operations in the State.  It produces both gold and silver with most recent production showing 13,951 ounces of gold and 7,907 ounces of silver.  The Mineral Ridge Mine employs 46 full-time personnel and 2 contract employees.

An often overlooked and underappreciated mining operation in the United States is sand and gravel mining.  It is certainly one of the most accessible natural resources.  It is a critical component of the construction industry.  Construction sand and gravel valued at $6.4 billion was produced by 6,500 mining operations in 50 states in 2012 (2013 USGS Minerals Information Report).  Sand and gravel is used in road bases, concrete aggregates, blocks, bricks, pipes, plaster and many other construction industry materials.

 In 2008, Sand and Gravel was the third most valuable commodity produced in Nevada.  Sand and gravel was valued at $225 million.   The most important source of sand and gravel aggregate is in the Lone Mountain area in northwest Las Vegas.  One of the five biggest producers in 2008 was Impact Sand and Gravel.  Each of the big five in Nevada produced more than 900,000 tons of aggregate.

IMPACT SAND AND GRAVEL OPERATION

IMPACT SAND AND GRAVEL OPERATION

Impact Sand and Gravel, located in Las Vegas, started in 1996 as Cactus Sand and Gravel with incorporation as Impact Sand and Gravel in 1999. Alora Edwards, in the Recruiting Administration Department explained, “Currently, there are about 60 employees at Impact Sand and Gravel.”  She said, “That includes in office and out in the field with approximately 45 full-time employees and 15 part-time.”  All full-time employees have medical insurance.

When asked what skill sets are required at Impact Sand & Gravel, Edwards said, “The skill set we look for in an individual varies depending on the position but with all of our employees or candidates, we look for people who match our company and core values.”  There is a social consciousness in the employment practice of Impact Sand and Gravel.   She explained, “We have hired several homeless people to fill security and labor positions.”

Just as in any mining operation, Impact looks for equipment operators, mechanics, accountants, admins, leaders, scale house operators; etc.  Edwards said, “At the moment, our most difficult position to fill is the Mechanics position.”  She adds, “In general, we do have some difficulty finding qualified individuals to fill our higher Management positions.”

Impact operates four quarry sites in the Las Vegas area– one near Cactus and Maryland Parkway, one at Rail Road Pass, one at Lone Mountain, and one in Boulder City.  When asked about how the business is affected by the economy, Edwards said, “The economy hurt almost everyone in 2009 and 2010.”  She said, “Fuel prices and the lack of construction have been the biggest challenges, ” and added, “Obama care is expected to more than double our health insurance costs.”

In terms of direct employment, Nevada’s mining industry is at the bottom of nonfarm payroll employment but the industry directly employs 16,300 full-time employees according to the Nevada Workforce Research and Analysis Bureau. Mining is at the top of employment percentage increases on a year-to-year comparison of the four major industries in Nevada.

The Bureau of Land Management reports, “In 2011, the top four gold producing countries in the world were #1 China, #2 Australia, #3 USA, and #4 South Africa.   They go on to say that “Nevada has the largest mineral materials program in the Bureau in terms of volume and value of mineral materials disposed.”   In production, Nevada is ranked (“Gold Investing” newsletter -January 13, 2011) as the fourth largest gold producer in the world.  “In 2011, Nevada’s gold mining industry produced approximately $8.8 billion in gross revenue” (Gannett report-March 5, 2013).

The Nevada Mining Association estimates that “Since 1990, mining has contributed more than $100 million each year to Nevada and local economies.”

Mining is big business in Nevada.

(A Version of this Article is Posted in the “Las Vegas Review Journal” 3/24/13)

A BETTER PHYSICIAN

Posted on by
Reply
Pin It

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.com

Better-A Surgeon's Notes on PerformanceBetter: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance

By Atul Gawande

Narrated by John Bedford Lloyd

“Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance” is about physician and hospital performance measurement.  With properly reported physician and hospital information, the author argues that doctors can make better medical decisions.  Doctor Atul Gawande suggests that hospitals and physicians that report and categorize successes and failures in treatment of patients improves all who practice medicine.

As in all walks of life, there are those who work to be the best they can be, and those who work to get by.  Doctor Gawande falls into the former rather than the latter category of working physicians.

DOCTOR ATUL GAWANDE

SURGICAL PHYSICIAN- ATUL GAWANDE

Doctor Gawande is a practicing surgeon at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, an associate professor of surgery at Harvard, and a writer.  “Better…” is a brief evaluation of medical service in the United States.  It contains more criticism than praise of the American practice of medicine.

On the one hand, Gawande praises American military medical practice that has reduced battle field deaths with the military’s use of statistical analysis to measure and modify medical procedures.  On the other hand, Gawande pointedly criticizes domestic hospitals for failing to collect and categorize medical information that measures successes and failures of doctors and hospital staff in treating patients.

Because medical treatments and results are not nationally codified, patients, doctors, and hospitals are unaware of statistically significant improvements in patient’ medical procedures and infection prevention programs.     Patients have limited ways of knowing which general practitioners are more successfully treating particular diseases.  Patients generally have less information about which surgeons have better surgical results, or what hospitals have fewer accidental infection outbreaks.  Changes in medical procedures that improve doctor and hospital performance are handicapped by lack of relevant statistical information about medical procedures that improve patient recovery and reduce hospital mistakes.

Gawande praises doctors that focus on improving their medical performance based on statistical reports that show patient results from common medical treatments.  The problem is that few medical treatment reports are based on broad doctor and/or hospital experience.  He gives the example of cystic fibrosis treatments that are more effectively performed in one place than another.  There is a wide discrepancy in the survival rates of cystic fibrosis patients in different treatment programs.  Gawande notes that systematic questioning of patients about treatment in one clinic results in longer lives for cystic fibrosis patients; while a clinic that relies on the mechanics of treatment, without careful questioning of patient’ treatment compliance, loses patients at earlier ages.  Detailed statistical studies can reveal differences in treatment of cystic fibrosis to improve patient survival rates.  Differences in treatment are a life and death consequence for stricken patients.

Gawande notes that per capita cost of medical services is too high in America and gives a startling comparison of what is done in India to show how much can be done to combat disease with a fraction of what American’ patients pay.  Gawande criticizes insurance industry interference in doctor/patient relationship.  He vilifies Obama-care because it fails to offer any solution to insurance industry’ encroachment on doctor/patient relationship.  In fact, Obama-care increases rather than decreases interference.  (In fairness, the political influence of insurance industry lobbying limits  legislator’ and President’ flexibility in changing American medical policy.) On the other hand, Gawande notes that Obama-care offers medical care to people who receive no health care except in emergencies which unfairly burden general tax payers and bankrupt marginally employed patients.

Gawande touches on the unconscionable fees that doctors pay for malpractice insurance to protect themselves from both nuisance and legitimate patient lawsuits.  Gawande sees both sides of the issue.  He interviews a surgeon that abandons his practice to become a lawyer. The doctor, turned lawyer, files lawsuits against doctors on behalf of patients that have been harmed by physician’ mistakes.  Mistakes happen because the medical profession is no different from any human endeavor.  A mistake at a construction site like a mistake in surgery may end in death.

Gawande suggests that doctors and hospital staffs should be held responsible for their mistakes. However, Gawande notes that insurance companies distort the process of settlement in the same way they distort medical treatment for patients.  For an insurance company, settlement is strictly a matter of cost; not whether a doctor is guilty of negligence but how much it will cost to settle the lawsuit in respect to revenues received from insurance premiums.  Gawande suggests that some kind of sinking fund be established by the medical profession to handle disputes between doctors, hospitals, and patients.  The legal system remains a part of the process but settlements are more physician/patient related than insurance/doctor/patient related.

Gawande shines a light on dark corners of medical practice in the United States and suggests ways American medical mistakes can be reduced, methodology constructively changed, costs better controlled, and service equitably improved.

AN UNEQUAL LIFE

Posted on by
Reply
Pin It

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.com 

The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy

By: David Nasaw

Narrated by: Malcom Hillgartner

 

“The Patriarch” is a revealing fact-filled account by David Nasaw of the father of the 35th President of the United States.  Nasaw plays no favorites in reporting historical facts and political movements of early and mid-20th century America.  Nasaw’s research invades Kennedy’s privacy to document public and private correspondence with history makers of his time. Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. praises, and abrades the greatest men, and some of the most beautiful women, of the mid-20thcentury.  Joseph P. Kennedy lives an unequal life in a land of equal opportunity.

JOSEPH P. KENNEDY FAMILY 1938

Nasaw tells the story of Kennedy’s life—how he became rich; how much he loved his

DAVID NASAW

family; how he provided for family financial security; how he influenced and was influenced by Franklin Roosevelt; how he became Ambassador to Great Britain; and what he thought of Neville Chamberlain, Winston Churchill, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, and Joseph McCarthy.  In Nasaw’s unfolding of historic American and world events, one finds some very personal details of Kennedy’s life.  Though Kennedy adored his wife and family,

ROSE KENNEDY

he is an unfaithful husband; having affairs with famous women like Gloria Swanson and Clarie Boothe Luce.

IMAGES OF GLORIA SWANSON: http://www.youtube.com/embed/3twMobLkcb8” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

CLARE BOOTHE LUCE (1903-1987)

Nasaw explodes myths of Joseph P. Kennedy’s life in showing him to be a pragmatic businessman with a view of the world that is at once prescient and myopic. Kennedy did not make his early fortune by being a bootlegger.  Kennedy lived the life of the American Dream.  He became one of the richest men in the world by capitalizing on a pre-1929 unregulated stock market, a beginning film industry, and a rising real estate market after WWII.  Kennedy’s actions to achieve wealth are shown to be evidences of business acumen and counterfeits of social vision.

The irony of Joseph Kennedy’s life, as a maker and protector of financial wealth, is that he was the patriarch of social visionaries; i.e. his sons–John, Robert, and Ted Kennedy.  Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. is shown by Nasaw to be mired in a belief system that characterizes American isolationists before, during, and after WWII.  In spite of post-WWII knowledge of the genocidal slaughter of 6 million Jews, and 2.5 million gentile Poles, Joseph Kennedy refuses to believe American intervention is more important than economic security.

IMAGE FROM THE LIBERATION AT BUCHENWALD (APRIL 1945)

Joseph Kennedy’s myopic vision is that dictators like Hitler or Stalin are like immoral businessmen that can be negotiated out of existence.  With hindsight, that vision shocks one’s sensibility. In Kennedy’s world, everything is negotiable. Like most pure business visions, there is only bottom line profit and protected wealth—the belief that if you are negotiating with a bad actor, one agrees to rules that both bad and good actors adhere to.  In other words, if everyone knows the rules, then the pure business mind thinks justice will be served; i.e. the presumption is that bad actors will eventually fail because of immorality, conscience, or misuse of agreed upon rules.  David Nasaw shows Joseph Kennedy to be a man of pure business vision; a belief that everyone’s self-interest should be preserved so that each rises or falls based on a “good” businessperson’s or leader’s inherent ability to prevail.  In the long-term, that may be true, but in the long-term, we are dead; in the short-term, there may be infinite and unjust pain.

Nasaw reveals Kennedy’s blind spots by showing how pure business vision (focus on profitability and financial security) leads to factional thinking that leads to “we-they” arguments; i.e. isolation of those who disagree and conspiracy theories that are one step removed from discrimination; two steps from isolation; and three steps from annihilation. One does not believe Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. is prejudiced against Jews or any religion or ethnic group after reading or listening to “The Patriarch”, but it shows how reasoning ability can be distorted by focusing on ends without consideration of means which is the mantra of the “pure” business mind.

Joseph Kennedy grows to believe there is a Jewish cabal maneuvering to takeover the media to influence government because he reasons that all consequences have precisely definable causes.   When his son, Jack Kennedy campaigned for President, Joseph Kennedy felt the Catholic Church organized to defeat his son without thought that there were many reasons  individual catholics would not vote for his son.  When a precise cause cannot be identified, the human mind tends to manufacture causes.  Joseph Kennedy uses a narrow focus of attention that makes sense in the business world but misses nuances of cause and effect in a political world.

Politics have an important role in life because they deal with means; not just ends. Life is not only a business decision; i.e. ends are more than profit and financial security.  Proof of the need for a broad vision of life is offered in David Nasaw’s history of Joseph P. Kennedy’s life; i.e. a life filled with good and bad behavior, joy and tragedy; in unequal measure.  Joseph P. Kennedy outlived four of his nine children–Joseph Jr. (killed in WWII),Kathleen (died in a plane crash),John F. (assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald), and Robert Kennedy (assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan).