Displaying items by tag: Limestone

US: The Board of County Commissioners of Boulder, Colorado, has denied Cemex USA’s application for a 15-year extension to its Dowe Flats quarry mining licence, following its expiry on 30 September 2022. Commissioner Claire Levy cited dust, traffic, noise and disturbances to wildlife as reasons behind the decision.

Cemex USA’s nearby Lyons cement plant has previously relied on the quarry for the supply of 760,000t/yr of limestone.

Italy: Buzzi Unicem has obtained technical evaluation certification for CEM II/C-M Portland composite cement products to be manufactured at its Trino, Vernasca, Settimello, Guidonia, Barletta and Augusta plants. The new cements will be part of its C-Green product line and the sustainability objectives from its 2030 roadmap. The new products will reduce their clinker factor by using granulated blast furnace slag, fly ash, pozzolan and limestone. They potentially offer up to a 40% reduction in CO₂ emissions per tonne compared to CEM I equivalents. They will be available in 32.5 N/R and 42.5 N/R strength classes for a range of applications. The cement producer hopes that the new products will quickly establish themselves in the market and even becoming the “standard cement” in Italy by 2030.

Bangladesh: The high rate of the US Dollar against the Bangladeshi Taka is forcing local cement producers to raise their prices despite an increase in imports of volumes of raw materials. The country imported 5.12Mt of clinker, granulated slag, limestone, gypsum and fly ash in July and August 2022, a rise of 34% year-on-year, according to the Daily Star newspaper. Golam Kibria, the general manager of Premier Cement, said that the negative currency exchange effect was the main cause of local price rises for cement since the cost of raw materials on international markets had remained stable in recent months.

The country imported 36.1Mt/yr of raw materials for cement production in the 2021 – 2022 financial year. These materials mostly came from Thailand, Vietnam and China through ports in Chattogram and Mongla. This compares to imports of 16.8Mt in the 2017 – 2018 financial year.

US: The Boulder County Planning Commission has recommended that county commissioners should reject Cemex USA’s application to extend its licence to mine limestone at its Dowe Flats quarry until 2037. Local press has reported that Cemex USA previously agreed to shut down its Lyons cement plant at the expiry of its extended licence in 2037. The company says that it will be able to continue operating the plant without use of the mine.

Cemex USA executive vice president Trpimir Renic said "We do always try and consume the raw materials that are available to us at the existing site where we are currently operating. We think that operating that quarry for the next 15 years - supplying Lyons cement plant - is the most responsible resource management operation that we can undertake."

Vietnam: The State Audit Office of Vietnam (SAV) has uncovered limestone mining activity above licensed levels by multiple subsidiaries of the Vietnam Cement Industry Corporation (VICEM) between 2017 and 2022. In 2021, Vicem Bim Son’s Yen Duyen quarry yielded 499,000t of limestone, 14% above its licensed capacity. That same year, Vicem Hoang Mai extracted 154,000t of limestone from its Hoang Mai B quarry, 8.5% above capacity, while Vicem Tam Diep extracted 111,000t from its Hang Nuoc quarry, 6% above capacity.

The Viêt Nam News newspaper has reported that the SAV has asked Vicem to review the causes of the discrepancy between production and licences and clarify its responsibility.

US: Calucem, part of Cementos Molins, plans to establish a new calcium aluminate cement plant in New Orleans, Louisiana. The company will invest US$35m in the project and expects to commission the plant in mid-late 2023. It expects to create 70 new direct jobs and a total of 228 new jobs locally.

Calucem president and chief executive officer Yuri Bouwhuis said “Calucem is taking on a new investment that will support our growth and diversification in the US and ensure that we continue to offer high-value products to our global customers. Our choice of Louisiana for our first all-new manufacturing project in the US is due to the availability of strategic raw materials such as limestone and natural gas, access to waterways and skilled labour and the long history of using speciality cement products in the US.”

Kyrgyzstan: Kant Cement has begun excavating the Severnaya Gryada limestone deposit near to its Kant cement plant. The producer says that the limestone has a higher purity than that from its existing Agalatas mine. It therefore expects the Kant plant to reduce its raw materials consumption and eliminate a part of its dust emissions. Kant Cement currently replaces a part of the limestone in the plant’s cement production with 65,000t/yr of fly ash.

UK: Aggregate Industries and Coomtech have partnered to develop low-energy kinetic drying technology for pulverised fuel ash (PFA) from power plant. The partnership will see Aggregate Industries use Coomtech’s kinetic dryers in its PFA processing, as part of its effort towards increasing the volume of waste materials incorporated in its products to 3Mt/yr from 1.5Mt/yr by 2025. The project has attracted funding from the UK government Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS).

Chief commercial officer Chris Every said “We’re delighted to have the support of Aggregate Industries in this grant project. Coomtech is especially pleased to have the business’ ongoing technical and commercial input to the project operation and analysis of performance. In addition, the opportunity to work together with a brand that is leading the way in creating new materials that will prove fundamental to the future of the construction sector and meet net zero objectives.” Every continued “The added benefit of our new drying technology is its flexibility - providing the potential to dry a wide range of materials being considered to aid the greening of the cement industry, including limestone, ground blast furnace slag (GBFS), natural pozzolans and other crushed and milled minerals that can offer an activated character to combine in cement and concrete mixes.”

Germany: Cemex Deutschland has acquired a 53% majority stake in Saxony-based stone mining company ProStein. ProStein’s six quarries yielded 3Mt of raw materials in 2021. Cemex Deutschland says that the acquisition doubles its own raw materials capacity.

ProStein is the leading stone producer in Eastern Germany, where Cemex Deutschland operates its Rüdersdorf, Brandenburg, cement plant.

Burundi: The government of Burundi says that it is ready to sign a credit letter with Dangote Cement for the establishment of a cement plant in the country. In this way, the government hopes to provide a long-term solution to the on-going national cement shortage. In the meantime, the government urged Dangote Cement to devise ‘modalities for the supply of construction materials’ into the country.

Burundian delegates at a meeting with Dangote Cement on 8 July 2022 said that Northwest Burundi is endowed with abundant limestone reserves.