Displaying items by tag: Sustainability
Canada: Progressive Planet is preparing to build a 3200t/yr pilot plant for its PozGlass product at its headquarters in Kamloops, British Columbia. The company aims to commercialise its process, which produces pozzolan from recycled glass for use in cement or concrete production. The pilot unit will also sequester CO2 released by a gas dryer at the site, from which it will produce sodium carbonate. The pilot plant is expected to go under construction in 2023 and be operational in 2024.
Steve Harpur, the chief executive officer of Progressive Planet, said “With PozGlass, a CleanTech breakthrough from our C-Quester Centre of Sustainable Innovation in Kamloops, we are producing one of many upcoming private-sector solutions that are needed to meet the 2050 Net Zero targets to fight climate change.”
Progressive Planet aims for PozGlass production to be situated at cement kilns, where PozGlass could be mixed with Portland cement at a 50:50 ratio.
France: CRH subsidiary Eqiom expects to complete its carbon capture system installation and kiln upgrade at its Lumbres cement plant under the EU's K6 Programme in early 2028. The project uses Air Liquide's capture technology, whereby purified CO2 is liquefied for storage or use in building materials production.
Etex joins the First Movers Coalition
03 March 2023Belgium: Etex has joined the First Movers Coalition to help reduce carbon emissions related to cement production. The coalition seeks to explore options to reduce the carbon footprint of cement used in the building and construction industry by as much as 80% compared to the 2021 US emissions baseline. Etex wants to contribute to worldwide advanced research and development developments in the field of cement. Once developed, Etex and other players will help the new technologies gain ground by buying at least 10% near-zero cement per year of their total cement volume by 2030. The plan follows Etex’s 2030 decarbonisation target reduce greenhouse gas emissions (intensity of scopes 1 and 2) by 35% compared to 2018.
Etex is a light buildings materials manufacturer with products such as gypsum wallboard, insulation, building systems, cladding and fibre cement boards.
Germany: The Science-Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) has validated Heidelberg Materials' new 2030 CO2 reduction targets. The targets have a base year of 2020 and conform to a 1.5°C climate change framework. Per tonne of cementitious material, the producer is now committed to reducing its Scope 1 CO2 emissions by 24%, its Scope 2 CO2 emissions by 65% and its Scope 3 emissions by 25%.
Heidelberg Materials' chief sustainability officer Nicola Kimm said “As reflected in our updated Sustainability Commitments 2030, climate action is a crucial element of Heidelberg Materials’ sustainability strategy. The SBTi validation shows that our sustainability agenda not only includes the most ambitious reduction target in the cement industry – but also a realistic, measurable plan in line with the 1.5°C scenario. We follow a clear, science-based approach, reducing our carbon footprint through the levers of product and process innovation and industrial-scale carbon capture, utilisation and storage. By closing the carbon and material loops, we will lead the sustainable transformation of our sector.”
In 2019, Heidelberg Materials became the first cement company to secure SBTi validation for its emissions reduction commitments.
Spain: Cemex España will install a carbon capture system at its Alicante cement plant in Valencia, as part of its efforts to make the unit a 'benchmark pioneer low-CO2' cement plant. The producer holds a contract with ET Fuels for the supply of 45,000t/yr of CO2 captured at the facility for methanol production.
Chief executive officer Fernando González said “Our goal of reaching net-zero CO2 emissions is achievable and will be driven by collaboration and innovation. Our decarbonisation roadmap includes reducing emissions to the lowest possible level through proven levers such as clinker substitution and alternative fuels. New levers, such as rapidly developing CCUS initiatives, must effectively tackle the remaining CO2 emissions to hit our ambitious 2050 objectives.”
Cemex's European CO2 emissions decline by 41% between 1990 and 2022
24 February 2023Europe: Cemex’s annual CO2 emissions from its European operations fell by 41% in 2022 compared to 1990. It added that it had cut its emissions in the region by 12% between 2020 and 2022. The group attributed the decline to the success of its climate action strategy to date, including a large investment in a new alternative fuels facility in the UK, investments in solar power plants in Germany and Poland and the roll-out of its Vertua reduced-CO2 products across the region.
Regional president Sergio Menendez said "As we begin to implement the next stages in our climate action strategy, we now expect to exceed our 2030 aspiration of hitting a 55% CO2 reduction in our European operations. While we are progressing important carbon capture projects and policy advocacy for our ultimate net zero target, these 2030 interim aspirations are not reliant on this technology.” he continued, “This is certainly a challenging target, but I am confident that with innovative thinking, close collaboration between our different business areas and further development of our regulatory framework, it is both feasible and profitable. This sustained effort is vital if we are to meet our global, primary objective of becoming a net-zero CO2 company by 2050. We will continue to provide regular updates on our progress.”
Heidelberg Materials increases sales as profit drops in 2022
23 February 2023Germany: Heidelberg Materials' sales increased by 13% year-on-year to Euro21.1bn in 2022 from Euro18.7bn in 2021. This was despite a 6.1% drop in cement and clinker volumes, to 119Mt from 127Mt. Heidelberg Materials' cement and clinker volumes fell by 10% in Western and Southern Europe, by 7.8% in Northern and Eastern Europe-Central Asia, by 14% in North America, by 1.3% in Africa-Eastern Mediterranean Basin and by under 1% in Asia-Pacific. The group's materials costs rose by 23% to Euro21.4bn from Euro18.8bn. Meanwhile, its profit dropped by 9.4% to Euro1.72bn from Euro1.9bn.
Chief executive officer Dominik von Achten said "It’s evident that we can only be profitable in the long term by shaping our future as a company in a climate-compatible way, further reducing the footprint of our products and closing material loops. We are making good strides in all areas. Compared with the previous year, we were able to reduce our specific net CO2 emissions by another 2% in 2022. Our carbon capture, utilisation and storage projects launched worldwide are progressing favourably. At our CCS project in Brevik, Norway, we are well on track with the construction of the world's first CO2 capture plant in our industry, and we look forward to commissioning in 2024." Von Achten continued "We have made a good start to 2023. The fourth quarter showed that we have laid a good foundation for the development in this year. Volatility on energy and raw material markets remains high, but the current easing in energy prices is giving us some breathing room. On the demand side, government infrastructure plans should compensate for the decline in private housing construction. We are optimistic about the further course of the year.”
Bogala Graphite launches graphene oxide cement additive
23 February 2023Sri Lanka: Bogala Graphite has launched its new cement-strengthening graphene oxide additive. Daily FT News has reported that potential investors will be able to discuss the new technology with Bogala Graphite at the forthcoming Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0 exhibition later in February 2023.
Update on cement industry advocacy, February 2023
22 February 2023The Portland Cement Association (PCA) has launched a new website to promote the US cement industry’s progress towards net zero. It’s always interesting to see the different approaches the various associations around the world take in promoting the sector especially in response to mainstream media coverage that has often taken a negative view of cement and concrete. As sustainability thinking has permeated into society the stereotype that cement production releases vast amounts of CO2 for little gain has been a hard one to shake off. Readers can draw their own conclusions on how well the PCA site works by looking at cementprogress.com.
Make no mistake, the PCA’s new website is a marketing tool designed to bring out some of the points of its carbon zero roadmap to a wider audience. Yet it is refreshing to see a national association website attempting to tell the general public what progress the cement industry is making towards reducing its CO2 emissions. Unfortunately, it then avoids giving out any data that presents an overview of how it’s all actually going. This may come with time though as the roadmap was only released in late 2021. One number that does stick out on the site is that the PCA uses the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) carbon emissions data to calculate that the manufacture of cement accounts for 1.25% of total CO2 emissions in the US. This is lower than the global figure of 7% that is often used from the Center for International Climate and Environmental Research - Oslo’s (CICERO) research. Both figures appear to be broadly correct based on the available data.
The real story here is to showcase the wide range of actions the PCA is taking as part of its roadmap. In the cement section, for example, the PCA is rightly able to demonstrate its recent work driving the transition to Portland Limestone Cement (PLC) production in the US. This then leads on to the usual beats of resilient construction, carbonation and a ’whole society’ approach to tackling the decarbonisation of the cement industry with suggestions that everybody from citizens to contractors to policy makers can do.
The wider context is that the big challenge facing cement advocacy groups today is that sustainability is a global issue but that such groups have generally been national or regional for most of their history. The national or regional cement associations have existed for decades serving the local needs of their members. This started to change in 1999 when the Cement Sustainability Initiative (CSI) was created with its global approach to sustainability for the sector with its data gathering and technology roadmaps. In the 2010s global media attention started to focus on the large share of CO2 emissions the cement industry was emitting as, coincidentally, China became the world’s largest cement producer. Then in the late 2010s the two global cement associations - the Global Cement and Concrete Association (GCCA) and the World Cement Association (WCA) - emerged with the GCCA taking over what the CSI did previously.
One problem that the PCA and the other associations face is that decarbonising the cement and concrete sectors is hard to do, expensive and will take decades. Until, or if, carbon capture is suddenly conjured up at scale, all of this work is inherently seen as boring by much of the media compared to, say. young photogenic environmental activists supergluing themselves to roads. One way to fight back against this is to show progress font-and-centre and to try and take back control of the narrative. This appears to be what the PCA is trying out in a more direct fashion than usual. The risk though is that any action by an industry-backed lobbying group to show off the work it is doing will simply be labelled as greenwashing, whether it’s fair or not. Of course, some environmentalists indulge in their own reverse version of this (industry staining?) to make the powerful but simple argument about the necessity of cutting CO2 emissions but without taking fully into account or underplaying the scale of the societal changes necessary to do so. Either way, the cement industry and its advocates have an uphill struggle on their hands in the years ahead. This may require fresh thinking about how to win over hearts and minds.
The March 2023 issue of Global Cement Magazine includes an interview with Claude Lorea from the Global Cement & Concrete Association (GCCA)
Rohrdorfer commences carbon capture at Rohrdorf cement plant
22 February 2023Germany: Austria-based Rohrdorfer has started up an amine-based carbon capture system at its Rohrdorf cement plant in Bavaria. The producer plans to ultimately expand the system up to a capture capacity of 1500t/day. The inauguration follows a successful continuous trial of the technology since August 2022, excluding a regular kiln maintenance period over winter. Austria-based Andritz designed the system specifically for the Rohrdorf cement plant. It yields CO2 that is suitable for numerous applications, including in food and beverages and in intermediate products in pharmaceuticals production. The Rohrdorf cement plant also hosts a formic acid plant which uses captured CO2.
Rohrdorfer aims to achieve carbon-neutral cement production by 2038. Alongside production-related optimisations, the producer plans to realise its aim through a future expansion to the Rohrdorfer plant’s carbon capture system and the implementation of a further carbon capture upgrade at a second cement plant in Austria.