Displaying items by tag: precalciner

France: Fives has secured a contract to supply a 65MW Pillard NOVAFLAM Evolution burner to a cement producer. The customer’s aims are to continue to maximise alternative fuel (AF) use, to improve clinker quality and to reduce NO_x emissions at its cement plant. The order also includes precalciner burners and a natural gas-powered 35MW Pillard hot gas generator, as well as valve trains and pumping systems.

Greece: Titan Cement Group has secured an EU patent for its robotic remote preheater system, previously installed at the company’s Kamari cement plant in Viotia. Titan Cement Group designed the system to maximise operational efficiency and safety.

The company carried out a Euro25m precalciner installation at the Kamari plant in 2021 – 2022.

France: Germany-based ThyssenKrupp has won a contract for the installation of a new 4000t/day clinker line at Ciments Calcia’s Airvault cement plant in Poitou-Charentes. The supplier expects the new line to double the plant’s clinker capacity while also reducing its CO2 emissions. It is intended to replace the two existing lines at the site.

ThyssenKrupp will supply a 1200t/hr double-shaft hammer crusher, a longitudinal blending bed, a 370t/hr Quadropol QMR² 45/23 type vertical roller mill and a 10,000t tangential blending silo to process raw materials for the line. A single-string, five-stage Dopol type cyclone preheater with integral calciner will be supplied that is suitable to use with alternative fuels, with the possibility of conversion to oxyfuel in future. ThyssenKrupp plans to preassemble the preheater, reducing anticipated construction time ‘by several months.’ The plant also includes a Polytrack clinker cooler, a solid recovered fuel (SRF) preparation line and dedusting systems. Commissioning is scheduled for mid-2024.

No value for the project has been disclosed by Ciments Calcia or ThyssenKrupp. However, Ciments Calcia previously announced a proposed investment of Euro300m in January 2021.

Nepal: Udayapur Cement has commenced a US$42m upgrade and capacity expansion of its cement plant at Jaljale. The work includes replacing the shell of its 20m rotary kiln by the end of February 2022 and installing a reinforcement suspension preheater system, according to the Kathmandu Post newspaper. It will expand the plant’s capacity by 38% to 0.4Mt/yr from 0.29t/yr. The plant’s current equipment dates to 1988. Company spokesperson Laxman Pokharel said "Since the machines are old, we face frequent problems." He added that this has led to increased costs.

The Nepal government has agreed to loan Udayapur Cement US$34.4m, 80% of the project’s budget.

Russia: Italy-based Buzzi UniCem subsidiary SLK Cement has concluded an environmental agreement with the Sverdlovsk Oblast Ministry of Energy and Housing and Communal Services for the co-processing of solid municipal waste at its 1.0Mt/yr Sukholozhskcement plant. AMF Online News has reported that the transition, part of a nationwide government initiative called simply ‘Ecology,’ entails a modernisation of the kiln line, which the company says will be commissioned in 2023 or 2024. SLK Cement general director Andrei Immoreev said that alternative fuels use will not only increase production efficiency, but will also contribute to solving the environmental problems of the region.”

US: California-based Heliogen has developed concentrated solar-thermal plants (CSPs) with the ability to focus sunlight to generate temperatures over 1000°C by micro-adjusting mirrors using computer technology. It has now engaged Parsons Corporation to build arrays of its CSPs for installation in cement pre-calciners. Requiring 900°C heat, these represent the largest part of the industry’s CO₂ output. The technology will firstly reduce this by replacing fossil fuels with a clean heat source, which moreover entirely bypasses the electrical grid. Heliogen CEO Bill Gross says that the installations will make carbon capture and storage (CCS) of the remaining CO₂ emissions from the conversion of limestone to lime easier by removing other pollutants. Heliogen is now targeting 1500°C from its CSPs, which would enable them to supersede cement fuels in kilns.