Displaying items by tag: UK
Hanson appoints Andrew Simpson as packed products director
29 January 2020UK: Hanson has appointed Andrew Simpson as its packed products director, adding operational responsibility to his commercial remit. He is responsible for sales of all of its packed products, including cement, ready-to-use concrete and aggregates, and will now also look after manufacturing at the company’s ready-to-use production site in Nuneaton, as well as its construction aggregates packing plants across the country.
Simpson started his career with Hanson in 1997 when he was appointed area sales manager for Castle Cement, part of the HeidelbergCement Group, which bought Hanson in 2007. Since then he has held a number of different sales roles and attained a degree in Business Studies from De Montfort University in Leicester. In 2017 he was honoured with the freedom of the City of London and installed as a Liveryman of The Worshipful Company of Builders Merchants in recognition of his work within the builders’ merchants’ industry.
Metso Corporation to centralise European warehouse operations
27 January 2020Finland: Machinery manufacturer Metso Corporation has announced plans to consolidate its European warehouse operations, currently spread over Norway, Sweden, the UK, France, Spain, the Czech Republic, Turkey and Russia, into a single location. Metso Corporation customer logistics senior vice president Jarkko Aro said the move ‘would also enable considerable savings in end-to-end freight costs and reduced CO2 emissions.’ 40 employees are potentially affected. Metso Corporation has not disclosed any locations under consideration for the facility.
CMA to investigate Breedon’s Cemex acquisitions
23 January 2020UK: The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has issued Initial Enforcement Orders (IEOs) to Breedon Group and Cemex over the former’s acquisition of a minority of UK ready-mix and aggregates operations, as well as a cement terminal, belonging to the Mexican cement giant for Euro211m. Breedon Group said that the IEO was expected and would govern, among other things, the ‘form and scope of the information that can be shared between Breedon and Cemex’ in defence of customers’ interests, according to The Construction Index website.
HeidelbergCement on global Climate Change A-List
21 January 2020UK: Global not-for-profit organisation CDP has included HeidelbergCement on its Climate Change A-List 2019 for environmental transparency and performance aimed at facilitating a zero-net carbon economy. Only a handful of industrial producers achieved inclusion on the list, including the German steel sector’s Thyssenkrupp and French gypsum wallboard producer Saint-Gobain.
Quinn Building Products installs WHR at Quinn Lite Plant
21 January 2020UK: Quinn Building Products has fitted a waste heat recovery (WHR) plant into the aircrete block production process at its Quinn Lite Plant in Fermanagh. The installation will pump thermal energy from excess heated water back into the pre-curing chamber to sustain the chemical processes by which the blocks are aerated. Quinn Lite production manager Kieran McGorman said that the upgrade ‘forms part of a larger, company-wide drive to minimise the impact of our operations on the environment and to maximise efficiencies wherever possible.’
Tarmac goes nuts for squirrels
21 January 2020UK: Tarmac has marked the UK’s national squirrel day (21 January 2020) by renewing its commitment to conservation at one of England’s rare red squirrel habitats: its Harden quarry in Northumberland. Harden quarry manager Gareth Williams said, “The team has set up a feeding station and has been working to monitor the number of visitors.”
Two Tarmac employees are trained squirrel wardens and are responsible for keeping track of the resident red population.
MPA Cement publishes 2019 Sustainable Development Report
17 January 2020UK: The Mineral Products Association (MPA) Cement’s five members – Breedon Cement, Cemex UK, Hanson Cement, Lafarge Cement and Tarmac – saw their direct CO2 emissions per tonne of cement rise by 0.6% year-on-year to 633kg in 2018 from 629kg in 2017. Refuse-derived fuel rates in 2018 were 43.2%, down by 0.5% from 43.8Mt in 2017. The industry achieved its seventh consecutive year in which producers sent zero process waste to landfill. Overall sales fell by 1.0% year-on-year.
Cemex UK and Turners start bulk cement distribution deal
17 January 2020UK: Cemex has agreed a new partnership with Turners, a privately owned transport company. This contract will see Turners operating 20 bulk cement tankers for Cemex across the country. No value for the deal has been disclosed.
“We are always looking for ways to improve our logistics operation, and this partnership with Turners will create new flexibility in our service, thanks to their large fleet of safe and efficient heavy goods vehicles (HGV),” said David Hart, Cemex’s Supply Chain Director for UK & France.
Alan Why appointed as Bunting’s UK Sales Manager
08 January 2020UK: Bunting has appointed Alan Why as its UK Sales Manager overseeing all external sales activity. His engineering career began as a radio-frequency (RF) electronics design engineer and evolved into the role of Sales & Marketing Director of a small electronics company serving the defence electronics market. Why has developed magnet-related business for Bunting since he joined the company in 2013. The responsibilities of his new role cover a wider product range including magnets, magnetic separators and metal detectors.
Bunting is a designer and manufacturer of magnetic separators, metal detectors, magnets, magnetic assemblies and magnetising equipment. The Bunting European manufacturing facilities are in Redditch, just outside Birmingham, and Berkhamsted, both in the UK.
UK: Cemex has entered a conditional agreement with Breedon Group for the divestment of certain UK assets, including 49 ready-mix plants, 28 aggregate quarries and a cement terminal for Euro211m including Breedon Group’s assumption of Euro27.3m lease liability. Cemex UK retains the 1.2Mt/yr Rugby cement plant in Warwickshire. Breedon Group CEO Pat Ward said, “We expect the deal to be accretive to both earnings and free cash flow in the first full year, with a positive ongoing impact on the cash generation of the enlarged Group.” Cemex CEO Fernando Gonzalez said that the transaction ‘further rebalances our portfolio into our core markets, enhances our profitability and enables us to continue to focus on deleveraging.’
The businesses being handed over also include concrete products operations, depots and asphalt plants and fall under all six of Breedon Group’s regional divisions. Ward has said the acquisitions will significantly enlarge the group’s footprint in underrepresented divisions, implying that the cement terminal in question may be the Leith terminal in Scotland or the Newport terminal in Wales, two regions in which the company currently has no terminals to receive cement produced at its 1.5Mt/yr integrated Hope cement plant in Derbyshire. Breedon Group will seek to hire employees working on the operations from Cemex and expects to bring its total UK personnel to 3600 people as a result. It says its mineral reserves will exceed 1.0Bt.
Cemex UK retains 259 concrete plants and 36 aggregates quarries and dredging operations. Cemex said it ‘will retain a substantial integrated business in the UK encompassing cement production.’