Displaying items by tag: Legal

Zambia: Two Italian managers working for Zambezi Portland Cement have had their residence permits revoked by the Zambian Immigration Department. Operations director Danielle Ventriglia and marketing director Valerio Ventriglia have both returned to Italy.

Home Affairs Minister Edgar Lungu denied that the managers had been deported. He stated that their residence permits had been revoked and consequently cancelled because the two directors based in Ndola had violated the Immigration and Deportation Act No 18 of 2010. Lungu said the government would deal with people who 'mistreat' Zambian workers and was determined to cleanse all institutions by uprooting 'bad elements'.

Zambezi Portland Cement Operations manager Mwamba Kayula appealed to the government to reverse the decision, saying that Ventriglia was behind the success of Zambezi Portland Cement. "This man has been operations director for the past two years, he was born in Luanshya and we still need to continue with his good work at the company," said Kayula.

Zimbabwe: South African cement producer PPC (Pretoria Portland Cement) has announced that its Zimbabwe subsidiary Portland Holdings Limited (PHL) has been awarded an indigenisation certificate by the government of Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe's Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Act requires that non-indigenous manufacturing companies operating in Zimbabwe must submit an empowerment plan, to satisfy a 51% indigenous Zimbabwean ownership requirement by October 2015. PHL had a pre-existing indigenous shareholding of 21.4%. It will sell an additional 29.6% to four indigenous parties in the country.

"We see the Zimbabwe market as an exciting growth opportunity and expect our operations to approach full capacity over the next two-three years. This opens up further investment opportunities for PPC in Zimbabwe," said PPC chief executive officer, Paul Stuiver.

PHL is the largest cement producer in Zimbabwe. Together the clinker manufacturing plant in Colleen Bawn and the milling depot in Bulawayo can produce over 1Mt/yr of cement. Zimbabwe has experienced a rapid increase in cement demand since 2009. National cement demand is currently estimated at more than 1Mt/yr.

Italy: Italian police have impounded Italcementi's Colleferro plant south of Rome for allegedly breaching emission limits. The company has been given 10 days to finish updating its facilities to bring them in line with European Union regulations. Production will continue during this period.

Italcementi said that the process of updating the plant had already been underway and would continue under special administrators appointed to operate factory by an Italian court. Colleferro has a capacity of 1.5Mt/yr and employs about 200 workers.

Justice officials said that the seizure for violation of pollution regulations was ordered by a court in the nearby town of Velletri, based on a report by the regional environmental protection agency, Arpa. This is the second case so far in 2012 of an Italian court seizure of a major factory for environmental reasons. Europe's biggest steel plant Ilva, based in southern Italy, was ordered to shut down in September 2012 by a court due to toxic emissions.

Namibia: Hans-Wilhelm Schutte, the managing director of Ohorongo Cement, has warned that the Namibian cement industry faces a serious challenge from foreign imports if existing import tariffs are lifted. Schutte made the statement in an affidavit filed with the High Court in Windhoek in the latest stage of a case in which a Chinese-owned cement importer wants to have the cement import duty declared invalid.

"The absence of infant industry protection will jeopardise (Ohorongo Cement's) entire operations in Namibia and may result in the need to retrench employees and down-scale (or totally halt) operations," Schutte has claimed.

Ohorongo Cement has filed an application with the High Court in which it is asking to be allowed to join the case in which a cement importer, Jack's Trading CC, has sued the Minister of Finance and the Commissioner of Customs and Excise in connection with the tariffs which have been levied on cement imports into Namibia since 27 July 2012.

According to Schutte, infant industry protection, which is allowed under the 2002 Southern African Customs Union agreement, was a precondition for the decision to establish Ohorongo Cement's plant in Namibia. Yet in his latest affidavit filed with the court, the majority member of Jack's Trading CC Yuequan Jack Huang, stated that he had signed a four-year contract to import 180,000t/yr of cement into Namibia.

Ohorongo Cement has set up a cement plant between Otavi and Tsumeb and invested about US$275m in the country. Ohorongo Cement has produced cement since February 2011. It has a capacity of capacity of 0.7Mt/yr and employs 316 people.

Finance Minister, Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila, imposed an import duty of 60% on cement with effect from 27 July 2012. Currently the 60% rate will remain in force until 2014 whereupon it will decrease annually to 12% in 2018. Namibia's domestic demand for cement is currently estimated to be about 0.5Mt/yr.

Egypt: An Egyptian court has ordered that the sale of Assiut Cement Company to Cemex be annulled. The plant will be returned to the Egyptian government as it was sold for less than its fair value. The court also ruled that all workers forced to retire after the sale may return.

Cemex bought 90% of the state owned factory in 1999 for US$580m in cash and assumed debt and currently owns a 96% stake. Under the court ruling, Cemex would be responsible for all the financial obligations its Egyptian business incurred since 1999. Cemex plans to contest the ruling and appeal the court's decision.

US: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has approved a new measure meant to help approve US state Montana's levels of haze pollution. The signing follows widespread criticism by industry, conservationists and even other federal agencies.

The proposal aims to reduce emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides that cause haze. It details US$85m in upgrades needed at the state's major contributors of small particles that contribute to park haze, mainly at the Colstrip coal power plant. Holcim's cement plant near Three Forks requires selective non-catalytic reductions totalling US$1.32m to achieve annual NOx emissions reductions of 556t/yr. Ash Grove cement plant near Montana City requires selective non-catalytic reductions and low NOx burners totalling US$1.19 to achieve annual NOx emissions reductions of 1088t/yr.

Many of the commenters, including Holcim and Pennsylvania Power and Light, questioned the computer models used to calculate the effect of various technologies on emissions. Companies also complained that the EPA underestimated the costs required to retrofit their plants with new equipment. In response to a Holcim comment, the EPA decided that Holcim did not have to install lime injection and scrubbers because the reduction in emissions didn't justify the cost. The total price tag for Holcim was originally estimated at US$6.2m.

Under the Clean Air Act, the air in national parks and wilderness areas in the US is supposed to be as clean as possible. To achieve that goal, regional haze programmes in several states set pollution limits on industries. The goal is to restore visibility to natural conditions in national parks and wilderness areas from Idaho to North Dakota by 2064.

US: The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) appears poised to soften particulate matter (PM) limits in its pending revised air toxics rule for cement plants, while separately pursuing an extended compliance deadline for the rule. Both moves would represent major concessions to industry groups that sought a weaker rule but have the potential to rile environmentalists who say such changes would be unlawful.

According to an industry source, EPA will propose to soften the rule's PM limits on smokestacks for existing cement plants. New data submitted to EPA by the industry shows that the limit of 0.02kg/t of clinker set by the final rule prior to reconsideration is not realistically attainable. Instead, the EPA will probably revert to a higher number, closer to the 0.043kg/t that it offered in its original proposal.

Environmentalists oppose softening the air toxics rule and recently warned the agency in written comments that, "any changes diminishing or replacing the existing standards would be flatly unlawful." The likely changes to the rule follow a series of 11th-hour meetings that industry officials and others have held with EPA and White House Office of Management & Budget (OMB) staff seeking to shape the proposal.

The Portland Cement Association previously presented a paper to the EPA arguing for an increase in the emissions limit for PM. "The current PM limit of 0.02kg/t of clinker is very stringent," reported the paper. "Very few facilities can comply with the clinker limit without major investments in new and upgraded PM controls."

US: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has sent for the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to review its proposed revisions to its emissions rules for the Portland cement sector, ahead of a tentative 15 June 2012 deadline for issuing the revisions in line with a proposed consent decree with the industry.

The pending proposed revised rules undergoing OMB review will address not only the remand but also the EPA's May 2011 partial reconsideration of the cement rules - including standards for open clinker storage piles and start-up and shutdown monitoring requirements - as those provisions included in the recent proposed consent decree with industry.

In the Register notice on the consent decree, the EPA says that it "would also agree to propose to extend the existing source compliance date of 10 September 2013, or in any case to discuss the possibility of extending that date, and to take final action by 20 December 2012 regarding the date of compliance," if such provisions are 'supported by the administrative record.'

While stalling the compliance deadline would be a 'win' for the cement industry, it would likely draw protests from environmentalists supportive of the current air toxics rule. The deadline for comments on the proposed consent decree is 7 June 2012.

US: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has agreed to delay maximum achievable control technology (MACT) air compliance for cement plants by two years. As part of on-going negotiations with the Portland Cement Association (PCA) if the EPA doesn't issues a proposal to this effect by 15 June 2012 then the PCA and other cement producers will be able to resume legal action against the pollution rulings.

Under the terms of a 16 April 2012 proposed consent decree, the EPA will have to issue by 15 June 2012 a proposal addressing a ruling on 9 December 2011 from the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The EPA's revisions will also have to cover separate pending industry administrative petitions. The EPA has been negotiating with the PCA over the terms of the proposed consent decree, following a ruling finding that the EPA failed to reconsider how a related incinerator emissions rule could potentially alter the cement rule's emission limits.

The EPA has also agreed under the proposed consent decree to finalise a revised MACT by 20 December 2012, but the settlement does not require that the agency finalise a two-year delay. Rather, the decree states that EPA must only include its 'final decision on whether to extend the compliance deadlines for existing sources' in the revised MACT.

The EPA and PCA also acknowledge that EPA must subject the agreement to public comment and review. The settlement further notes that, "if the federal government elects to withdraw or withhold consent to this Agreement" after considering public comments on it, "PCA shall have the right to withdraw from this Agreement and file a request to lift the abeyance requested by the Parties."

As environmentalists and states were not party to the settlement, this public comment would provide them with the first opportunity to challenge the possibility of a two-year delay for the rule's compliance deadline and changes to meet the other provisions in the settlement.

Lithuania: Akmene Cement, Lithuania's only cement producer, says it will be affected by the European Union's sanctions against Belarus. Previously the producer sold cement to the Belarusian company Triple, owned by oligarch Yury Chyzh, which has been affected by the blacklist.

"We discussed it today at our company. It is hard to say what it is going to be like now," Arturas Zaremba, head of Akmenes Cementas, stated. "I do not know myself how those sanctions would work. Does it mean that we will not be able to maintain any business relations with them? We will need to clear that up."

EU foreign ministers decided to impose sanctions against 29 Belarus companies and 12 individuals related with Alexander Lukashenko's regime. Akmenes Cementas exported around 70,000t of cement to Belarus in 2011.