Displaying items by tag: Plant

US: Ozinga Bros. Inc., a concrete producer, has been given the go-ahead to build a new US$250m cement plant in Chicago, Illinois. The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency issued a permit for the project in December 2011. A comment period has now passed with no known objections. Ozinga has 27 concrete plants in the Chicago area.

It is forecast that the new plant would provide around 300 construction jobs until it is completed in 2015. It would then be commissioned to a capacity of 1Mt/yr. The company has lined up a 50-acre site near Lake Calumet for the project, which was formerly a Cargill grain facility. Development officials are enthusiastically welcoming Ozinga's proposal as Chicago has suffered a massive loss of manufacturing over recent decades. No new industrial plant has been built within the city limits since the 1980s.

The proposal by a concrete producer to set up a new cement plant, which was first mooted in summer 2011, is surprising given the current financial and environmental regulatory climate. Ozinga says that it wants to be able to ensure a reliable supply of cement for its concrete, despite an estimated 60% drop in its revenue since 2007.

Ozinga is looking to keep pace with vertical integration by other concrete and cement producers, which it sees as a potential threat to its own cement supply. Commonly cement producers are looking to buy-up smaller concrete producers in order to increase efficiencies and their bottom lines. This move would see an unusual reversal of these roles. In previous economic booms, Ozinga has seen its cement supply dry up due to competition with larger producers. On occasion it has been forced to source cement from as far afield as Thailand and South Korea, increasing its transport costs to unsustainable levels. It fears that it may be left with the same problem again when demand for concrete returns in the US.

However, despite the enthusiasm from many quarters within Chicago, the Ozinga plant is far from a done deal. Expected to employ about 80 full-time employees, it could yet be subjected to an incentive-spiked bidding war between the job-hungry states of Illinois and Indiana. Ozinga executives have met with Govenor Mitch Daniels and other officials in Indiana, where Ozinga already has seven ready-mix plants, but neither state has yet offered project-specific incentives.

"We're happy to work with the group and show them the advantages Indiana has to offer," said Jim Staton, regional director in Crown Point at the Indiana Economic Development Corp. "We do that with every company." Ted Stalnos, president of the Calumet Area Industrial Commission, which has backed the project, said, "We would be very disappointed if Ozinga suddenly decided to go in that direction."

"This is like a survival move for us," said Martin Ozinga IV, the fourth generation at the 84-year-old firm. "If the economy comes back at some time, the country is going to be short (of cement) again." Ozinga added that he did not expect financing the project to be a problem, with banks already interested in the plan.

Saudi Arabia: More than 70 people are to be investigated in connection with the current cement crisis in Jeddah, which has seen cement become expensive and scarce since the start of 2012. Trucks owned by the accused were captured while selling cement at inflated black market prices in various parts of the city.

A special committee, formed by Jeddah Govenor Prince Mishaal bin Majed, raided about 15 warehouses where cement was being sold by foreign dealers. It is claimed that the dealers had signed agreements with contractors that were executing a number of government projects to sell them cement at high prices. "This has created an acute shortage in the quantities of cement available in the market," he added.

Prior to the commencement of the investigation, local press had reported angry crowds at points of sale and said that security forces had to intervene in some instances. Market sources believe the crisis was created by the inability of the factories to work at full capacity because they were not given enough fuel.

Abdullah Al-Ammar, a contractor, did not see any justification for the shortage. "This is an artificial crisis created by some traders who want to monopolise the cement market and stack it away in their stores, only selling it when the price goes up," he said. Al-Ammar asked the Commerce Ministry to impose harsher punitive measures against traders who were caught selling cement on the black market or hiding it. He hoped that the problem would be alleviated when two new cement factories are commissioned later in 2012.

Indonesia: PT Indocement Tunggal Prakasa has reported that it will build a US$500m cement factory with a production capacity of 3Mt/yr in the regency of Pati, Central Java.

Sahat Pangabean, Indocement's corporate secretary, said that the company was hoping that the process of licensing the plant would be completed within 2012 and that construction would start immediately afterwards. Sahat added that the company was currently in the process of conducting an analysis of the plant's potential environmental impact.

The project will be run by Indocement's subsidiary PT Sahabat Mulia Sakti and is expected to be operational in 2015.

Russia: Eurocement Group has announced plans to build a cement plant in the Samara Region in the Volga region. The groundbreaking ceremony took place on 19 January 2011.

The plant, which will have a dry-process kiln, will have a capacity of 2.4Mt/year. The facility will be located on a site of 40 hectares and its launch is scheduled for 2015. Eurocement plans to invest Euro395m in the project.

The announcement follows the start of another Eurocement plant in Spasskoe village, Blagodarnniy district, Stavropol Krai. Construction of this 1.3Mt/yr plant began in December 2011. Euro346m has been committed to this build.

Brazil: Votorantim Industrial, Brazil's largest diversified industrial conglomerate, intends to use proceeds from the sale of its stake in steelmaker Usiminas to expand its cement and mining output.

Chief executive, Raul Calfat, announced that the US$1.34bn raised by Techint's purchase of Votorantim's 13.5% voting stake in Usiminas had boosted the group's cash holdings to US$6.5bn. This high level of cash will allow the investment holding company to avoid borrowing at a time when financial markets remain shut for all but the most credit-worthy companies, said Calfat. It also gives the company room for funding heavy investment plans with its own cash.

Calfat said that the group's cement unit, Brazil's largest producer of the building material, would get one-third of the Usiminas stake sale proceeds. He said that the money would go towards the construction of four factories by 2013.

Bangladesh: HeidelbergCement officially inaugurated a new cement mill at its plant in the seaport of Chittagong on 12 January 2012. The ball mill, which cost approximately US$16m to construct, has a grinding capacity of about 0.8Mt/yr. Test runs of the new mill were conducted successfully at the end of 2011 and production started in the first week of January 2012.

"We are very pleased that we are able to officially inaugurate our state-of-the-art cement mill today," said Dr Bernd Scheifele, Chairman of the Managing Board at HeidelbergCement. "Bangladesh is an interesting market for HeidelbergCement. We expect the need for high quality cement to increase significantly in the coming years, especially due to new government infrastructure projects. With the new mill we are very well prepared for this growth in demand. The investment in Bangladesh is part of our long-term strategy to expand our cement capacities in attractive emerging markets by brownfield or greenfield projects."

The IMF forecasts a GDP growth of 6.1% for Bangladesh in 2012. The country currently has one of the lowest per capita cement consumption ratios in the world, but it is also one of the fastest growing markets.

China: Xinjiang Tianshan Cement Co Ltd, a cement and concrete manufacturer based in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, has today announced plans to raise up to US$444m via a public offering for six projects. According to the prospectus, the Shenzhen-listed firm will issue up to 120 million new shares at a price of US$3.27 each.

The proceeds will be used to build five cement production lines and a 1Mt/yr cement grinding facility in Xinjiang. Upon completion the projects company would see the company increase its number of cement production sites from 11 to 16.

By the end of 2013, the firm's total output capacity is expected to reach 46Mt/yr, of which 40Mt will be produced in Xinjiang. The cement supplier also targets 50Mt output capacity for 2015, including a massive 45Mt in Xinjiang.

Nigeria: The Nigerian president, Goodluck Jonathan, has said that the private sector is crucial in the drive by the government to diversify the economy. He said that Nigeria was currently 'over dependent' on oil. Jonathon used the official launch of the 1.65Mt/yr Lafarge WAPCO Lakatabu cement plant of Lafarge WAPCO in Ewekoro in Ogun State to highlight the importance of the cement industry in a more diverse Nigerian economy. The plant will take the company's cement production to 2.5Mt/yr in Nigeria.

The president described the cement industry as critical to his administration's drive toward moving the country away from a mono-cultural economy, critical to national survival. "If we do not discover oil reserves, our reserves will dry up; if that is true, we know that as a nation, we must prepare for our children and grandchildren," said Jonathon. "That is why we must diversify. That's why we must encourage our private sector to go into manufacturing."

The Chairman of Lafarge WAPCO, Chief Olusegun Osunkeye, said that the new plant will provide 1000 jobs and it would not relent in partnering with the government in its quest for socio-economic development.

Nepal: Two large cement factories, which are nearing completion in Dudhrash and Gogli in Dang, are preparing to commence production in early 2012. It is expected that the two plants will replace around 10% of the cement imports that currently come from India.

Basu Pandey, director of Sonapur Cement Factory in Dudhrash, said that construction work has almost been completed. "Some technical work is remaining and we hope to finish that within a month," he said, adding that the company will begin test-production by the end of December 2011. "We will be able to launch the product in the market within two months," he added. According to Pandey, Sonapur Cement Factory targets to produce around 700t/day of cement.

Sonapur Cement Factory is launching its products under the brand of 'Sona Cement'. It will manufacture OPC and Portland Pozzolana Cement. Sonapur has invested a total of US$415m on the project.

The other factory, which will brand its products as Ghorahi Cement, is also preparing to bring its products in the market within two months. Bikash Sharma, factory coordinator of Ghorahi Cements, said, "Test production will begin from February 2012 and the final production will start in March 2012."

Ghorahi Cement Factory is targeting to produce 1200t/day. Located in Laxmi in Dang, it plans to double its production in the future. "We will double our daily production to 2400t/day in a year's time," Sharma said, adding that Ghorahi Cement Factory would become the largest cement factory in the country. Both of the factories will use limestone from local mines of Dang and surrounding districts, which are more than 200 years old.

Iraq: Sinoma International Engineering Co Ltd, a Jiangsu Province-based Chinese company principally engaged in the mechanical equipment and cement businesses, has recently signed an engineering contract with Iraq-based Gulf Research Development. Sinoma will build a 5000t/day cement production line in the Kurdistan city of Sulaymaniyah at a cost of $180 million.