Articles on the cement industry from Global Cement

The Iberian Peninsula is located in the south west corner of mainland Europe. Around 85% of its land is occupied by Spain, with smaller Portugal occupying around 15% in the far south west. Andorra, France and Gibraltar (UK) also occupy very small areas. Spain has the largest population, economy and cement sector in the region, with Portugal operating a far smaller cement sector. Here, we discuss the main players, trends and prospects of these two national industries ahead of the Global CemFuels Conference, which takes place in Barcelona, Spain on 1 - 4 February 2017.

This article was inspired by comments made by a representative of a major cement group during the Global CemFuels Conference & Exhibition in Prague, Czechia in February 2016 that can be best summarised as: ‘There is no perfect rotary kiln burner on the market.’ This may well be true, but there are some very good ones available these days for those that want to optimise their production process and understand that burners are not just pieces of steel, bought by the kilo...

The title ‘cement plant with the lowest emissions in the world’ is not awarded every day. However, Kirchdorfer Zement spares no effort in the search for the best environmental protection. Here, it presents the development of emissions abatement systems at the plant, with a focus on the recent commissioning of a DeCONOx system from Scheuch GmbH.

Around 60% of a cement plant’s CO₂ emissions are from the calcination step. Received wisdom in the sector is that such emissions cannot be avoided and reduction of combustion CO₂ through dry processing, alternative fuels, waste heat recovery or other advanced solutions has historically been preferred. However, the Direct Separation Reactor from Australian firm Calix, which will be used in the Low Emissions Intensity Lime and Cement (LEILAC) project, will tackle the issue of CO₂ emissions from calcination head on. The technology has already been used commercially in the magnesite calcining industry. Peter Edwards spoke to key staff from Calix about the technology and its potential for the cement and lime sectors.

Cement producers around the world are under greater pressure than ever to maintain margins in light of difficult conditions in many markets. Once any apparent technical process solutions have been implemented, what else can be done to improve the performance of cement producers in terms of operational costs, suppliers, staff attitudes and management approaches? Here, we hear about the work of Alexander Proudfoot, a management consulting company with wide experience in the global cement industry, from Angus Maclean, the firm’s Executive Vice President for Client Delivery, Europe.