The world's copper supply isn't meeting the rising demands. In 2006, we were very concerned about the escalating costs and remembering in Save Your Pennies, I brought up that the construction process must change to counter these rising costs and to enhance energy and conservation of natural resources.
The world's copper supply isn't meeting the rising demands. In 2006, we were very concerned about the escalating costs and remembering in Save Your Pennies, I brought up that the construction process must change to counter these rising costs and to enhance energy and conservation of natural resources.The demolition of old or previous rented office spaces across the US faces another obstacle and that is removing old wiring per the National Electric Code. In Abandoned: Money In the Ceiling, the concerns are between potential disruption of installed cable plant, removal of scrap labor costs, and for costs to transport the scrap vs. payout.
Berk-Tek just announced price increases for four-pair copper and high-pair-count products are necessary for three primary reasons:
1. Worldwide copper demand continues to outpace supply: Copper costs are currently 49% higher than in January of 2007, and 18% higher than January 1, 2008.
2. Petroleum costs continue to increase: Petroleum is a main cost component of our jacketing and insulating compounds. Additionally, rising petroleum costs have led to higher freight and energy costs. Petroleum has risen 16% since the start of 2008 and has increased 111% since January 2007.
3. The falling U.S. dollar: Commodities traded in U.S. dollars get more expensive when the dollar's value falls.
Clearly construction processes must change and new methods for installing and preserving cable plant must be developed. Perhaps fiber can play a role if the fiber terminations can be made as easy and inexpensive to terminate as copper. Perhaps the jacketing materials can be changed or the factory guys can develop cost saving techniques. Wireless seems to be the easiest answer and the holdup there- is gluing the office phone to the cell phone or just having one phone that does it all.
Source: Comex
