Terminal Elevator
Categories: Tech
The phrase “terminal elevator” makes us think of that scene in Final Destination 2 with the elevator and the ponytail. But in the business world, a “terminal elevator” isn’t an elevator that kills us in a spectacularly disturbing fashion (so that’s nice), but rather a pulley system that moves really big, heavy stuff around. Specifically, it’s how huge piles of grain are moved onto the trucks, ships, and trains that carry them to their…wait for it…final destination.
But terminal elevators don’t just move the grain, oh no. They’re much more versatile than that. They also can also store, clean, inspect, treat, weigh, and measure the grain. They’re like a one-stop shop for getting grain ready to go wherever it’s going next, whether a brewery in Colorado or a barge headed for Japan.
They’re usually housed in very large buildings that look like big, boring cubes, or like a bunch of tall, skinny silos all mushed together into one structure, and they’re typically located in areas that are easily accessible by truck and/or train and/or boat. They’re super-handy, but unfortunately, since all the grain gets mixed together, they’re not the best solution for keeping separate types of grain—i.e., GMO and non-GMO grains—separated. Also, if a facility wants to be recognized as an official terminal elevator for commodity trading purposes, it has to be recognized by a trade exchange.
