BREWER, Maine — Cianbro’s Eastern Manufacturing Facility on South Main street has spent the last two years designing, constructing and delivering electrical building modules for a nickel processing plant in Long Harbour, Newfoundland.
“We loaded the last of the 22 modules this morning,” Cianbro Vice President Joe Cote, who is the general manager of the module manufacturing facility, said Tuesday. “Right now, weather and scheduling permitting, the barge will depart sometime midday on Thursday, subject to change, of course.”
Cianbro won a contract to construct the electrical building modules in September 2010 for Brazil-based Vale, a mining company that is constructing a nickel processing plant in Long Harbour, Newfoundland. Vale has mining operations all over the globe.
“This has been a very successful program for Cianbro and its team members and for its client,” Cote said. “We’ve delivered a high-quality product on time, and the client is very satisfied.”
Cianbro negotiated with officials from Vale and the Canadian provinces of Newfoundland and Labrador for about two years before being awarded the contract, Cianbro Chairman and CEO Peter Vigue said when announcing the multimillion-dollar contract that put 100-plus employees to work at the site. Workers in Pittsfield, where Cianbro is headquartered, fabricated much of the steel.
The massive gray structures, which included transformers, switch gears and major electrical components, were between one and three stories high and all were loaded onto barges and shipped down the Penobscot River and up the coast to the Canadian province.
“Although they work together to operate the plant, they also work individually,” Cote said of each electrical building module.
Because of business proprietary issues, Cote could not be more specific, but he did say the massive modules built locally were impressive.
“They are spotless and smell like a brand new automobile,” he said. “There are some pretty cool things.”
The South Brewer module facility, which opened in early 2008 replacing the old defunct Eastern Fine Paper Co., completed its first contract to build 52 refinery modules for a Texas company in June 2010 and was awarded the Vale contract three months later.
The recently completed Vale contract is another feather in the cap for Eastern Manufacturing Facility, he said.
“The workmanship and the quality that went into these electrical building modules is something for the resume,” Cote said. “It’s high-value and high-quality work and it’s quite impressive.”
Cianbro began transferring employees from the Brewer site to other Cianbro jobs as the Vale contract neared its end.
“They’re all working in projects in other areas,” Cote said. When a new contract is signed for the Brewer plant, “we’ll pull them back.”
Company officials currently are holding talks with international companies doing jobs “of significant scale” in North America, the vice president said.
“We have a lot of opportunities in front of us [but] we cannot say what some of those are right now,” Cote said. “We’re readying the yard for the next one.”
I think that Cianbro is doing a great job and by bringing good jobs into the Bangor/Brewer should be applauded.
The sad part is, that it is the Canadians who are able to buy these units for their mining project, while we here in Maine aren’t able to tap into our rather humble resources. I’d much rather see the Cianbro facility in Brewer cranking out these modules for orders from the USA.
I’m sure that Cianbro would be more than happy to make these types of units for an American firm, like they did for the company in Texas. Unfortunately, many American companies are not investing until they get a better understanding of what the economic climate will be in this country for the next few years.
Unfortunately American mining companies can’t do much in the good ole USA, especially Maine due to environmental laws.
Cheap Maine Labor.. anywhere else and they would pay $30+ per hour plus benies.. What does Cianbro pay 10 maybe 12 per hour.. Explotation of Mainers …. I heard that they profit share.. whats that going to be $200.00… LOL!!!
You wonder why young people move out of Maine. In Mass or Conn the pay is probably 3 fold.
Time to raise the minumin wage to $15.00 per hour for all jobs. even service jobs… Then you would see some cash flowing around and the tax revenue stream would be full
You obviously don’t know what you’re talking about. Are you one of the hired public agitators that have recently entered the State of Maine to try and sway public opinion against capitalists? I know from reliable sources that there are 11 organizations who have recently brought hired agitators to this State to wreak havoc with our political process.
Fill me in How much do they pay the MAINE employees on the site and how much do they pay the out of State employees doing the same job.. We Need the numbers, as I said CHEAP MAINE LABOR. They are great workers and do great work and should be paid what their out of state counterparts are getting.
Each worker is paid at exactly the wage rate that they agreed to work for, whatever it is. Union wages at many out of state job sites are the primary reason why we have such a large deficit for government-funded jobs. Be honest–are you one of the paid agitators that have been brought into Maine in the past few days??
No I’m not an agitator.. I like exposing the truth an options to better ways
Pushbuttons, just exactly what do you do for work? I’m curious as to how you pack all that wisdom into one head ?
self employed, have to think on your feet all the time. Thank you for asking.
That tells me you are your own boss. What is your profesion?
I am a Teaparty Democrat, that will keep you busy for a while.
That’s a contradiction in terms, like military intelligence! How do you get through each day? Lol
don’t feel bad because you didn’t know that a liberal and a democrat are 2 different things.
Usually the two go hand in hand. So what positions do you hold as a democrat that aren’t liberal?
Teapot er… crackpot
What’s your beef with Cianbro?
I lost respect when Peter decided to shove his highway down the throats of Mainers then sell the road to a foreign country/investor…
Why does a dumptruck driver in Maine make around 9.50 per hour to 12 per hour when across State lines they pay 18. to 20.? No wonder people prefer welfare.
So you disagree with an idea of one man so you attack the employees of the company by calling them cheap labor. Then you try and drag wages into the conversation to muddy the water and make a crummy political point out of it. Take you brand of commenting elsewhere. Thanks
you mean you want me to bring the truth else where.
Where’s the proof to back up your “truth”?? Oh and by proof i mean actual documents, not hearsay and opinion.
The question is; How much of this $18 to $20 dollars do those workers keep after the union gets done with them?
What you don’t seem to understand is that while Cianbro is a nonunion company, it’s an employee-owned company. Simply because they’re nonunion they can compete favorably with other Mass. or Conn. companies that are unionized.
I am editing this comment.
I understand that the reason factories move overseas is the same reason this plant is open in Maine.. Lower wages..
Mainers deserve to get paid what they pay in other States.
During the recessions, people with college degrees pumped gas and did anything they could to keep beans & rice on the table for their families. My point is – there’s no pay scale when you don’t work under a labor union contract. Cianbro is nonunion, but their pay is competitive with other construction/contracting companies. They have to be to retain well qualified workers. And at the end of the year, I’ll bet that employees share in the profits that their labor and their companies’ have produced.
Actually, lower wages is only a small part of the reason factories are moving their operations overseas. Corporations pay a 35% tax rate here in the U.S., which is the highest rate on the planet. Companies here also operate in a hostile regulatory environment, which has increased exponentially under Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid (especially while they enjoyed a super-majority until Scott Brown was elected to fill Ted Kennedy’s seat), with the help of Chris Dodd and Barney Frank. Companies are also holding their cash until they know whether Obama will be re-elected, in which case you can expect no new investment for another four years.
I see that once again you are pulling numbers out of thin air to make your “point”.
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