Statistics – Shanghai Metal Corporation

Container Summer Pavilions – Luxury for the Modest

Have you ever dreamed about having a summer cottage of your own? Are you considering to buy one or perhaps to build it yourself? Building a vacation house according to one’s own design sounds fantastic, but you might be worried about the costs or confused about the choice of material. Luckily, there is a solution – shipping containers!

Besides shipping goods, shipping containers are also suitable for building beautiful homes in low cost. Actually, the price of an individual 40 ft or 20ft shipping container starts from US 2000. There are at least two reasons why the price is that low.

First, the manufacturing process is standardized according to ISO regulations enabling businesses to put containers into mass production. Second, there is a lot of oversupply of containers. According to some statistics, nearly 10,000 units sink annually in the world’s seas and thousands will be abandoned after their first use (read more about a case).

Building out of recycled shipping containers is as good as using totally new ones, and it is also cheaper. Shipping containers are meant to last for ages and tolerate extreme weather conditions in the oceans. Therefore besides low-cost, shipping containers are also durable and can be considered as a form of sustainable building. Containers are so durable that they can even be converted into shelters for natural disasters.

What’s more, shipping containers come with unlimited design opportunities. The door solutions of shipping containers come in many forms and open-top containers can be transformed into swimming pools. Thanks to the pillars in their four corners, containers can be piled into a complexes of your desire. There are great examples of homes, hotels and stores that show container’s great architectural design. The container city in Mexico is know also for its visual design.

Inspiration for building an own container summer pavilion can be found in the container summer house competition organized by AC-CA. The pictures of these articles include representatives of the best contestant of the competition.

Besides vision and desire, you also will need the material. We in Shanghai Metal Corporation have a long history of providing standardized shipping containers for our international clients. We also have prefabricated container villa solutions that we ship worldwide. For more details about our products, please visit our website or send us an inquiry.

Tuomas P. // SMC Editor

Pictures and original articles: Bustler, Bustler, Competitiononline, AC-CA, Wikipedia on Shipping Container Architecture

#BuildingValueAcrossTheGlobe

How Much Petrol Costs Internationally

“Finland has produced so many brilliant distance runners because back home it costs $2.50 a gallon for gas.” Esa Tikkannen, 1979

“It’s better to have beer in hand than gas in tank.” Unknown

Some people would say petrol prices are one of the highest outgoings from their budget – but this isn’t the case universally. So what causes this?

The differences in gas prices across countries are due to the various taxes and subsidies for gasoline. All countries have access to the same petroleum prices in international markets, but then decide to impose different taxes. In some cases, like Venezuela, the government even subsidises gasoline and therefore people there pay close to nothing to drive their cars.

So, assuming you have a 60 liter car, the cost of one tank will vary considerably. A tank of petrol in Venezuela would buy you a candy bar ($0.60). A tank of petrol in Norway, the most expensive on the list, would get you a weekend holiday ($153). In China you could get an IPod ($81). In the UK you could get a family trip to the capital ($129). And finally in the USA, you could get dinner for two in a mid range restaurant ($58).

In fact production of gas is relatively the same universally. The crude oil, which is a mixture of hundreds of liquids of different boiling points is put into a huge column and heated from the bottom. The liquids with the lowest boiling points rise up the column and are collected from the upper regions. Other liquids are collected part way down and heavy oils are collected from the bottom. Tar is found to collect at the base of the column. Petrol is one of the low boiling liquids that are collected near the top. So in fact savings could be made from more efficient production processes, like updating their equipment.

Shanghai Metal manufactures steel petrol boilers. Our Boiler Plate Steel is in stock and readily available, and can be cut to size and shape according to specific design requirements. All work is governed by an independently accredited and regularly audited quality system and is ISO 9001 certified. To find out more, please visit our website, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Or you could try our new mobile app by scanning our QR code.

You can also read more articles by our team at SMC:

The Antarctican Training Programme – Could You Make It?

What Is The Mirror Paradox?

Do Oil Discoveries Cause Conflict?

Should We All Switch To Cycling?

Where Did ‘Loom Bands’ Come From?

Are You Apocalypse Ready?

Could You Abseil Down Big Ben?

Building Your Dream Kitchen

How A Tiny Anchor Can Hold A Whole Ship

Did You Know There Are 14 Kinds Of Spoon?

How To Make A Statement At Business Networking Events

How Do Telephones Actually Work?

Do Oil Discoveries Cause Conflict?

The conspiracy theorists will surely agree that oil and conflict is closely correlated – but do the statistics back it up? Economists have attempted to quantitative describe the relationship between discoveries of large oil fields and the probability of conflict.

Dube and Vargas studied this effect in Colombia and found that due to the concentration of oil profits being with the owners, extortion and kidnapping for ransom increased accordingly. This was described as a rapacity effect where it was in fact the money, not the oil that attracted conflicts.

Micheals found after conducting a worldwide regression that oil that it is actually the opposite –the increased wealth and opportunities from building the oil refinery actually decreased crime, as the potential criminals were less economically incentivized to commit crimes. The assumption that oil causes conflict stems from the anomaly that conflicts that arise due to suspected oil reserves rather than actual ones.

So in fact the building of oil drills and refineries can be beneficial to the surrounding areas, and the assumption they hurt an area was suggested to be untrue.

Shanghai Metal manufactures Salvage tools for oil drilling similar to those mentioned. To find out more, please visit our website, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Or you could try our new mobile app by scanning our QR code.

You can also read more articles by our team at SMC:

Should We All Switch To Cycling?

Where Did ‘Loom Bands’ Come From?

Are You Apocalypse Ready?

Could You Abseil Down Big Ben?

Building Your Dream Kitchen

How A Tiny Anchor Can Hold A Whole Ship

Did You Know There Are 14 Kinds Of Spoon?

How To Make A Statement At Business Networking Events

How Do Telephones Actually Work?

Food Trucks Industry Switching from Cheeseburgers and Fries to Lettuce Wraps and Kale Chips

Food truck vendors started to gain popularity in the United States around 2008, when citizens had to cut back on spending due to the economic downturn. Entrepreneurs saw this change in consumer preferences as a way to provide unique cuisine options to people at their convenience. Fast-forward five years, now there are many vendors in the marketplace and capturing the audience’s attention is becoming tougher than ever before. Now-a-days consumers are more cautious about the health benefits of the food they are putting in their body and, at the same time, are spending more and more time using technology to interact with the world around them. That is where unique marketing strategies by vendors come into play.

Many cities around in the US host a weekly event where food truck vendors gather at one location from lunch until early dinner. The event, called Food Truck Roundup, takes place at different lots across the city each week to attract customers from different areas.

It is not difficult to get started in the food truck industry but differentiating yourself from the masses of other trucks lined up downtown during peak lunch hours is a different story. Many food trucks are pertaining to healthy eating lifestyles by offering food catered to those who are vegan or vegetarian. Imaner Consultants, an ethical organization who specialize in vegan website involvement, calculated that 95 percent of vegans go out of their way to buy foods from ethical companies. The group also discovered that 96 percent of vegans use the internet as a way of locating vegan products. Some food trucks have taken these statistics into consideration and work to enhance the social responsibility of their trucks and portraying their vision on social media sites. When catering to vegans, vendors consider not only the type of produce they use when preparing each dish but also the type of fuel used in their trucks and the types of packaging and utensils used to eat the organic dishes.

The Cinnamon Snail, based out of New York, New York, won Mobile Cuisine's 2013 Vegetarian/Vegan Food Truck of the Year. The truck is known for its assorted pastries and desserts, soups, salads, and burgers. — The Cinnamon Snail, based out of New York, New York, won Mobile Cuisine’s 2013 Vegetarian/Vegan Food Truck of the Year. The truck is known for its assorted pastries and desserts, soups, salads, and burgers.

Aluminum foil is used by many trucks as a way to serve hand held meals like sandwiches and wraps. The foil is not only an easy clean up for guests but its recyclable capabilities cater to those concerned with preserving the earth. Vendors see it as a way to get the food to customers quicker and using foil doesn’t require any extra packaging material. It is a cost effective way to ensure the food inside stays the same temperature from the time it comes off the grill to the time the consumer opens it up to enjoy. Shanghai Metal Corporation offers a wide array of aluminum foil for packaging. To read more detail on the types of foil we offer be sure to check out our website here. Be sure to join the conversation in our LinkedIn Group, Facebook, and Twitter.

Sources: IBISWorld, Imaner Consultants, mobile-cuisine.com

By: Kristie Kaaa / SMC Editor

Here are 6 Fascinating Facts on the Container Shipping Industry, a.k.a. the “Invisible Industry”:

Shipping is the “greenest” mass transport
Almost 90 % of everything we buy arrives via ship
An estimated 17 million shipping containers are currently floating around the world
About 10,000 shipping containers get lost at sea every year
About 97% of all dry freight shipping containers have been manufactured in China.
The annual travel distance of a regular container ship is equivalent to 75% of the distance to the moon and back.

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Advantages of Aluminum Recycling

Aluminum structures can be lighter than steel structures, resulting in lighter vehicles, which can increase performance and/or operating economy. Aluminum alloys are more corrosion resistant in typical vehicular applications.
Every minute of every day, an average of 113,200 aluminum cans are recycled. Used aluminum drink cans can be recycled and back on supermarket shelves as new drink cans in as little as 60 days (or 2 months).
It’s not just cans! Check up SMC wide range of aluminum products at http://goo.gl/K1d7sS

Why recycle? Recycling aluminum cans reduces waste. It also saves energy, conserves natural resources, and cuts down the amount of waste that needs to be buried in landfill sites.
Aluminum cans are worth money to collectors. Cash for Cans centers will pay for every kilogram recycled. This is a great way of raising money for your school, Cub or Brownie pack or a favorite charity – or just for you!
20 cans can be made with the energy needed to produce one can using raw materials.
Did you know? Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to run a television for three hours.
Recycling aluminum takes 95% less energy than producing it from its raw materials. The recycling process also generates only 5% of the greenhouse gas emissions.
Aluminum can be recycled over and over again without losing any of its properties. It is impossible to tell the difference between recycled or ‘primary’ aluminum.

One of the properties of aluminum is that it melts at a much lower temperature than other metals. So melting down ‘old’ aluminum uses much less energy than the smelting process. It also produces fewer gas emissions, so is much better for the environment.