In the final part of our Mining Financial Basics series, we briefly cover ten common financial terms you might hear around the mine site. This is the final post in the series, and I hope you’ve enjoyed the series and learnt a little about the financial concepts you’re likely to encounter around a mining operation or mining company head office. To finish off, here’s a brief list of some other common financial terms you might hear:

Earnings Before Interest and Tax – this is the most common measure of what we normally call profit. It is total revenues minus total costs, but excluding the costs of paying interest on borrowings or paying tax. Interest and tax are excluded to basically show the net profit achieved before taking into consideration taxes and finance costs. We exclude interest and tax as these costs are not directly related to how profitable or well performing the operation is. They are more like costs of doing business rather than directly telling us how well we are going. EBIT is the most common form of measuring operational profit.

Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation and Amortization – another measure of profit. This time it is revenues minus costs, again excluding the costs of interest and tax. This time we also exclude depreciation costs (see below) and amortization costs (see below). Again this is just a different measure for profits taking out some additional measures that aren’t directly related to operational performance (i.e. depreciation is more related to capital assets than how well the business actually did).

Depreciation is basically how much the assets of the business decline in value. For example your car will decline in value over time – if you were a business, the amount by which it declines in value each year could be claimed as a depreciation cost. It is recognised as a cost even though no cash is involved. It is essentially a cost item which recognises how much value the company’s assets have lost each period.

Amortisation is the same as depreciation, except it applies to loss or gain in value of intangible assets of the company. Where depreciation applies to physical capital assets, amortisation applies to intangible assets. Intangible assets are those things a company puts a value on, even though there is nothing that physically exists. Intangible assets include things like the value of goodwill, a brand, deferred tax assets, patents, and capitalised R&D - things that make the company worth more in rotary kiln and dryer machine manufacturing even though you can’t actually see them. Amortisation then is recognising the change in value of these assets as either a cost or revenue to the company, which once again is obviously a non-cash item.

Executives at manufacturing companies across state are grappling with a perplexing dilemma: Despite unemployment remaining at a traditionally high level, manufacturing is being crippled by a lack of skilled workers. This problem is not new. Manpower Inc. reported in its “2009 Talent Shortage Survey” that manufacturing-related occupations — skilled trades, technicians, engineers, et al — rank among the top five positions that employers were having the most trouble filling. Fast forward three years later, and the problem is not getting any better. An October 2011 survey from Deloitte and The Manufacturing Institute showed American manufacturers cannot fill as many as 600,000 skilled positions.

More disturbing is that the survey results show that while 67 percent of manufacturers say they have a moderate to severe shortage of available and qualified workers, 56 percent expect the problem to increase in the next three to five years. Demand for skilled workers is at a peak, a crescendo that threatens to drown out any possibility of a recovery in the sector. Sixty-four percent of respondents to the Deloitte survey say this lack of talent is having “a significant impact” on their ability to expand operations or improve productivity. Many West Michigan manufacturers are tired of the search for talent. They are finding they have to grow their own.

"People are just starting to realize that they need to grow these skilled workers from within or with internships they can use to train them in the most beneficial way,” said William C. Small, VP of technical services at The Right Place Inc. and west regional director of the Michigan Manufacturing Technology Center. “That can be quite an undertaking.” The trend of companies developing internal avenues for talent development is in its infancy, Small said, noting that many seasoned people on the manufacturing shop floor are being asked to step up to management. While Small said many people believe candidates have a great opportunity to pursue CNC machining, for example, he believes the need among local manufacturers is a little more general than that.

Now, they don’t feel so blessed. Sources say that not only are the veteran skilled workers gone from the industry, but also the younger generations — those at ages when people historically went into manufacturing — want nothing to do with factory life. They’ve been tempered by a negative image many people associate with manufacturingof vibrating screen and other mining machines such as Raymond mill. They — and their parents, in many cases — believe it is dirty and dangerous, even though advanced manufacturing is none of the above, experts say. That has been a problem for manufacturing since the mid-1970s. But now the sector faces a new dilemma. It was counted out for so many years, and its rebirth has been totally underreported.

When a pair of socks is designed from scratch specifically to suit the mining industry, we just had to check out a pair and see how good they are!

The feet of a miner have a hard time that’s for sure - stuck in rubber or leather boots for twelve hours on end through heat, cold, dirt, mud and water. We’re on our feet a lot and our boots always eventually end up full of dirt or leaking water at some point. The socks we wear are pretty important then in keeping us comfortable, hygienic and productive shift after shift.

I’ve just been sent a pair of socks that have been designed by a miner, specifically for use in the mining industry, both surface and underground. The socks are produced and sold by Miners Corp Essentials, a Perth-based company started by a miner who saw a need and came up with a solution!

The socks feature a number of elements custom made to make them more practical, durable and comfortable in a mining environment:

(1) Elastic at the top helps the sock stay up above the top of a gumboot or long boot

(2) Elastic section around the middle of the foot keeps it in place in your boot

(3) Thick, hard wearing material (and I’m told they’re made in st1:country-region w:st="on" New Zealand to ensure the quality)

(4) Sanitized to reduce foot odors etc

(5) Constructed to maximize moisture absorption

(6) Good cushioning under all of the foot

I’ve been trialing a pair the Miners Corp “Gumboot” socks for a few months now, with long lace up boots, gumboots, and short elastic-sided boots.

The material is holding up well despite the amount of wear I’ve been giving them, and the amount of times they’ve been wet and dirty. They fill my boot well but didn’t heat up my feet when it was warm. They seem to wash out well, and the elastic is all staying nice and tight to keep them up above the top of the gumboot (the way I like it!). In fact after a few months of wear they’re still as undamaged and tightly fitted as when I got them.

Overall, Miners Corp seem to have done a good job of designing a sock with the right features for mining environment for manufacturing impact crusher and other professional vibrating screen, and then gone and got them made out of some quality materials to make sure they’ll last. Let me know in the comments section below if you’ve tried them, and what you think of the idea – are there any other features they should have added?

There are few formal education requirements for new extraction workers, although a considerable amount of job training and experience is needed before workers can perform most duties or advance to more skilled positions. Skilled maintenance and construction workers usually need several years of vocational training in their field, while workers in professional occupations need at least a bachelor"s degree.

Workers in extraction occupations usually must be at least 18 years old, be in good physical condition, and pass a drug test. A high school diploma is not necessarily required, but is usually preferred; some companies also require workers to pass a basic skills test. Most workers start as helpers to experienced workers and learn skills on the job; however, formal training is becoming more important, as more technologically advanced machinery and methods are used. Given the increasing complexity of operations and the sophisticated nature of technology used today, employers now demand a higher level of skill and adaptability, including the ability to work with computers and other more complex equipment. As a result, some employers prefer to hire recent graduates of high school vocational programs in mining or graduates of junior college or technical school programs in mine technology. Such programs usually are found only at schools in mining areas.

Because of the unique dangers in mining operations, workers also need extensive safety training. The Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977 mandates that each U.S. mine have an approved worker training program in health and safety issues. Each plan must include at least 40 hours of basic safety training for new miners with no experience in underground mines, and 24 hours for new miners in surface mines. In addition to new miner training, each miner must receive at least 8 hours of refresher safety training a year, and miners assigned to new jobs must receive safety training relating to their new task. The U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) also conducts classes on health, safety, and mining methods, and some mining machinery manufacturers offer courses in machine operation and maintenance as well. Increasingly, mines use more high-tech tools for miner training, such as machinery simulators and virtual reality simulators. By simulating actual mine conditions and emergencies, mine workers are better prepared and companies can instantly assess a mineworker"s progress and skills.

As workers gain more experience, they can advance to higher paying jobs requiring greater skill. A mining machine operator"s helper, for example, might become an operator, or a roughneck may become a derrick operator. Due to the extreme environment and critical nature of the work, offshore oil crews generally are more experienced than land crews. Many companies will not employ someone who has no knowledge of oilfield operations on dryer machine and ore beneficiation machine manufacturing to work on an offshore rig, so workers who have gained experience as part of a land crew might advance to offshore operations. Positions are usually filled on the basis of seniority and ability. Miners with significant experience or special training also can become mine safety, health, and compliance officers, whose duties include mine safety inspection.

Environmental concerns will continue to affect mining operations. Increasingly, government regulations are restricting access to land and restricting the type of mining that is performed in order to protect native plants and animals and decrease the amount of water and air pollution. As population growth expands further into the countryside, new developments compete with mine operators for land, and residents are increasing their opposition to nearby mining activities. These concerns, together with depletion of the most accessible coal deposits in the East, will result in a shift in coal production. Coal mining will increase in the Central, and particularly the Western, United States and decrease in the East. Overall, coal mining employment is expected to grow by 4 percent as rising demand for coal is coupled with limited productivity gains from more efficient and automated production operations.

Employment in mining for metal ores is expected to decline by 10 percent through 2018. Because metals are used primarily as raw materials by other industries, such as telecommunications, construction, steel, aerospace, and automobile manufacturing, the strength of the metal ore mining industry is greatly affected by the strength of these industries. Most metals are sold and bought in a world market, so demand stems not only from domestic industries but also from fast growing industries in developing countries. Demand from these countries has caused prices for many metals to increase substantially in recent years. This has caused st1:country-region w:st="on" U.S. mining companies to expand production at existing mines and restart production at some mines that were closed when low metal prices made them unprofitable. However, in the long term the potential stabilization of prices together with many of the same environmental concerns as in coal mining will cause employment in metal ore mining to decline.

Nonmetallic mineral mining should experience little change in employment. Although demand will continue to increase for crushed stone, sand, and gravel used in construction activities, advances in mining technology will require fewer workers for operation and maintenance of new mining machines. Like the metal ore mining industry, the nonmetallic mineral mining industry is influenced by the strength of the industries that use its outputs in the manufacture of their products. Nonmetallic minerals are used to make concrete and asphalt for road construction and also as materials in residential and nonresidential building construction.

Transportation costs for stone, sand, and gravel are high, so mining of these materials is spread across the country, making it not as susceptible to industry consolidation. This geographical spread, together with the small size of many mines, also causes some mines to operate only during warm months. Many workers laid off during the winter find jobs in other industries and must be replaced when the mines reopen. Jobs in nonmetallic mineral mining attract many migrant workers and those looking for summer employment.

Despite an overall decline in mining industry employment, there will be job opportunities in most occupations due to the need to replace workers who leave the industry. A large number of workers, particularly in the professional occupations, will become eligible for retirement in the coming years, and some companies may have trouble coping with the loss of many experienced workers to retirement at a time when the industry is expanding production on dryer machine and ball mill machines. At the same time, past declines in employment in the industry have dissuaded potential workers from considering employment in the industry, and many colleges and universities have shut down programs designed to train professionals for work in mining. Employment opportunities will be best for those with previous experience and with technical skills, especially qualified professionals and extraction workers who have experience in oil field operations and who can work with new technology.

Employment in mining is projected to decrease. The growing U.S. and world economies will continue to demand larger quantities of the raw materials produced by mining, but the increased output will be able to be met by new technologies and new extraction techniques that increase productivity and require fewer workers. Wage and salary employment in mining is expected to decline by 14 percent through the year 2018, compared with 11 percent growth projected for the entire economy. Mining production is tied closely with prices and demand for the raw materials produced, and as prices for oil, gas, and metals have risen rapidly in recent years, production and employment in the industry have also grown. In the short term, employment may fluctuate due to changes in prices, but over the course of the projections period, technological advances will increase productivity and cause employment declines in the mining industry as a whole.

Petroleum and natural gas exploration and development in the United States depends upon prices for these resources and the size of accessible reserves. Stable and favorable prices are needed to allow companies enough revenue to expand exploration and production projects. Rising worldwide demand for oil and gas-particularly from developing countries such as India and China-is likely to cause prices to remain elevated and generate the needed incentive for oil and gas producers to continue exploring and developing oil and gas reserves. U.S. reserves of oil and gas should remain adequate to support continued production through 2018. However, environmental concerns, accompanied by strict regulation and limited access to protected Federal lands, also continue to have a major impact on this industry. Restrictions on drilling in environmentally sensitive areas and other environmental constraints should continue to limit exploration and development, both onshore and offshore.

In addition to resource availability, new production technologies also will impact employment in the industry. New drilling and extraction techniques allow for more efficient production from a reduced number of drill sites. As a result, employment in oil and gas extraction is expected to decline by 16 percent through 2018. However, changes in policy could expand exploration and drilling for oil and natural gas in currently protected areas, potentially boosting employment. Demand for coal will increase as coal remains the primary fuel source for electricity generation. Although environmental concerns exist regarding coal power-burning coal releases pollutants and carbon dioxide-few alternatives exist on a scale large enough to meet the fuel demand of utilities. Natural gas burns cleaner than coal, but coal power plants manufacturing hammer crusher and professional rotary kiln machines equipped with scrubbers reduce this disadvantage, and natural gas prices have been more volatile than coal prices in recent years. Future increased use of nuclear power or renewable energy sources, such as solar or wind power, could reduce demand for coal, but over the projection period neither is expected to increase rapidly enough to contribute significantly to U.S. energy supplies.

How are governments laying down the law to ensure health and safety in the mining industry? Joseph A. Main, Assistant Secretary of Labor for the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), talks to Sarah Blackman about the US Department"s policies and what lessons his fellow politicians have learned from recent global mining disasters. We"ve heard from several global mining conglomerates about how they are implementing important strategies into their sites to ensure their staff is protected from harm. Over the years they have acquired modern technologies and equipment to prepare workers for potentially dangerous situations and introduced multi-gas monitors, hazard detections systems and intelligent mine management software to decrease the risk of a life threatening event.

But, what are governments doing to improve health and safety in the mining industry? US mining spokesman Joseph A. Main explains how his government is guiding workforces to prevent future mining disasters and provides details on the policies being enforced in the country to make sure miners are held accountable for violating critical safety standards. The history of mine emergencies has taught us that we can never be too prepared to respond to these life-threatening events. Despite the development of modern rescue equipment and techniques, gaps still remain that can hamper or harm a successful mine rescue effort. The Pike River mine disaster consisted of a series of four mine explosions. There has been much speculation about the cause of these explosions ranging from pumps, cables, collapse, lack of methane drainage and so on.

We will not know for sure until the mine investigation concludes and a final report is published. However, we know communications and power were knocked out. Mine operators must design mines to prevent these types of events, conduct risk assessments to identify hazards and make critical systems more resilient and redundant. The Copiapó mining accident in Chile involved the collapse of the one and only mine entry. The mine was located in a very remote area. Drillers and drilling resources had to come from great distances, some from the United States. A mine rescue capsule had to be fabricated in country to implement the escape. Lesson learned - mining companies must maintain at least two escape ways at all times (a requirement in the US). Drilling technology needs to be identified before an incident occurs and arrangements with drillers should be made in advance. Pre-surveying, matching important locations underground with markers on the surface, is essential.

During the last five years, mine safety has improved through, among other things, the implementation of the MINER Act, the use of impact inspections to target problem mines, a revamped pattern of violations programme and the Rules to Live By initiative. In fact, according to preliminary data, 37 miners died in work-related accidents at the nation"s mines in 2011, the year with the second-lowest number of mining deaths since statistics were first recorded. MSHA places a major emphasis on miner training and we have awarded more than $3m in Brookwood-Sago Mine Safety Grants since 2007. These grants are specifically aimed at providing the funding for education and training programmes to better identify, avoid and prevent unsafe working conditions in and around mines when manufacturing sand maker and other mining machines such as ore beneficiation equipment.

Many people might think of Genzink Steel as a local steel supplier, welding company and erector of steel frame buildings. That view would have fit the company up to the turn of the 21st century, but since then, the 50-year-old fabricator has shifted its focus more to companies outside the state and region in a range of growth industries.

“People would be surprised how much out-of-state and out-of-country work we do — and the companies we work for,” Ken Genzink, president of the company and son of founder Donald Genzink, told MiBiz in an exclusive interview. “We work with top-grade international companies.” The company got its start at the family’s farm in Holland, where it made clothesline poles and crates for hog farmers and performed welding jobs for customers around the area. He got its first big break making machine bases for Prince Corp. and others in the die industry. Building off that success and capitalizing on the manufacturing boom, the business started a structural steel division and had a part in the construction of many local plants, which led to additional contracts for maintenance and various steel items for the shop floor, ranging from bridge cranes to mezzanines, he said. “In the late ’80s and ’90s was when things really started to grow,” he said.

Another major shift, both in terms of industries served and how their partners with other companies, occurred when the company started building mining shuttle cars for Joy Mining Machinery, a major manufacturer of “the Cadillac of mining equipment,” said John Maxson, COO of this Steel and the manager of the shuttle car project. That he was able to meet Joy’s high standards of workmanship and on-time project deliveries led the Holland supplier to work with other segments of the mining industry. “They said that if you’re able to work with Joy, you’re the type of company we’d like to work with,” Maxson said, noting the project helped hem secure business with major public companies including the likes of Halliburton, FMC Technologies and Wärtsilä. It is now beginning to target private mining companies. “The focal point has been around our core competencies in heavy duty, complex fabrication. … The value we bring isn’t something they can get in their backyard, and that’s surprised us as the days go on. We ask ourselves, aren’t there someone between their local area and Holland that could do what we do? It’s a testament to the quality of people we have here, our discipline of process flow, and making and holding people accountable.”

He excels by delivering consistency on low- to medium-volume projects. Taking a page out of the auto industry, it aimed to deliver high standards for production in industries that did not normally demand such exacting quality, Maxson said. In many cases, they were leading their customers’ expectations higher, and that led him to be considered a preferred supplier-to the point where customers are looking to move new hammer crusher products to the company or place them there from other ore beneficiation machines suppliers.

Dry magnetic separating equipment is commonly used iron and manganese equipment, mainstream intensity of mineral processing equipment. This machine used for dry magnetic separation of magnetic minerals beneficiation machinery, as opposed to wet one to use when sorting mineral liquid as a diluent to improve separation efficiency, the equipment is required to be separation of the mineral drying, particles can move freely, into independent free state, otherwise it will affect the magnetic effect, or even result in non-separation of the consequences. Dry magnetic separating machine is used for particle size below 3mm magnetite, pyrrhotite, roasted ore, limonite and other materials, wet magnetic separation, but also for coal, non-metallic minerals, building materials and other materials in addition to iron work.

Germany Coal washer is an important washing machine in coal washing process. We know, when the raw coals are mined from underground, they need to pass some coal working procedure so that coal can be used in our modern life. Coal washing is an essential pre-process of coal cooking. Coal can divide into raw coal and clean coal. Raw coal is generally used as fuel for energy, clean coal or fine coal is used for coal cooking. Clean coal should be washed with water to sulfur, to impurities and other industrial processes, in order to achieve the criteria used coke. Germany Clean coal needs to be washed with water to sulfur, to impurities along with other industrial processes; to have the criteria used coke. So, coal washer also known as coal washing machine plays a crucial role within this coal processing. Clean coal ought to be washed with water to sulfur, to impurities along with other industrial processes, to have the standards used coke.

How is the washer machine is installed and debugged?

1. Motor should outfit rain shelter to protect equipment from creep age.

2. Sand washer ought to be installed on the rear of vibrating screen. The rotary direction must strictly according to the requirement.

3. Check every connective bolt has been fastened before trial run.

4. Check every movable part continues to be lubricated ahead of when trial run.

5. Drive belt pulley run by man before trial run. Make sure there are not any blocks along the way of working, then user can transport on blank test. During two hours there aren’t any striking, pulley swinging and bearing loosen occur as well as the bearing temperature rise cannot exceed 35 centigrade. In the event the above trouble occurs, please stop machine immediately and check it.

6. The machine needs to be installed on the reinforced concrete. Beside this, machine users have to develop a concrete sedimentation basin to handle the waste water. The waste water can be reused after precipitation. These techniques not just meet the environmental requirement but additionally reduce the sand’s cost.

7. Because this machine’s working place and conductor materials are contacted with water, so users must ensure the lead is insulated.

Coal mill plays an important role in the coal-fired power plant. The other type of coal mills are grinding mill. The coal gradually breaks into powder. The outlet of the mill includes a blower that blows the fine powder up to the boiler furnace.

After the coal has grind to micro powder, it will transported to boilers via a round pipe. The crushed coal is conveyed using primary combustion air into the furnace side of the boiler. The coal powder is feed into the coal mill through a central inlet pipe where gravity is used to lead the coal to the bottom of the coal mill, where the grinding table and heavy rollers of coarse powder pulverizes or micro powder grinding mills pulverizes the coal to particles. The air flow is fed through the mill with the purpose of heating and lifting the coal particles out of the coal mill and into the boiler furnace. Though coal has many usages such as gasification, liquefaction, ethanol production, the major usage is used as fuel and coke. In order to make full use of coal and reduce the pollution of the environment, after the coal have been mined, people usually crush the larger coal block to small one by coal crushing plant, use coal mill or coal pulverize to grind the coal.

Coal Crusher is acknowledged in coal processing industry for a long time. Hongxing Machinery has many years manufacturing experience in coal crushing plant (coal crushing process, washing plant and conveyor equipment). Hongxing Machinery is a major coal crusher supplier for power plants and coke ovens, crushing limestone for blast furnaces, and crushing a wide range of raw and manufactured materials for industry. As the largest exporter in the design and manufacture of coal crushers and spare parts, Hongxing crushers are used in a wide variety of material reduction and processing applications in 100 countries around the world. As coal powder is the most important fuel in the power plant, the plant owners need coal mill or coal pulverize to grind the coal to micro powders. Raw coal (crushed) is fed through hopper at the top of the coal pulverize and falls down to grinder ring to be pressed, crushed and milled into pieces by rollers. After the first crush, coal powder fall into the second and third layer. The pumping of the high-pressure centrifugal blower put the outside air into the coal mill. The coarse coal powder will be brought into the classifying machine. In the coal crushing plant, coal crushing can resize the coal stone so that it can be easily handled and processed. For the Mesh hardness of coal is usually under 5, the miners can use jaw crusher, JC jaw crusher, impact crusher, and hammer type crusher etc. to handle it. After the coal has been crushed, we need screening equipment to grade the coal by size and then transport the coal via conveyors. In this process, dewatering screen is optional to remove water from the product.