Silicon Valley, California; Essential Elements computer recycling yard in San Jose. Owner and founder Bob Kaiser, seen here with a pan of gold plated parts recovered from computers, was a roofing contractor who panned for gold in California rivers on weekends until a friend told him "there's gold in computers". He started by scavenging dumpsters and now runs a multi-million dollar business recycling computers for precious metals and for scrap sales to mainland China. (1999).