Turkey: Medcem Çimento has obtained the ISO 14001-2015 certification for environmental management. The ISO 14000 family of standards provides tools for companies to manage their environmental responsibilities.

Cameroon: Cimencam will spend US$70m to upgrade its integrated plant at Figuil. A new kiln is being built at the plant to meet increased demand from export markets in Chad and the Central African Republic, according to the Cameroon Tribune newspaper. The subsidiary of LafargeHolcim is also building a cement grinding plant at Nomayos.

Mozambique: Cement imported illegally from South Africa has been seized at the border town of Ressano Garcia. Customs impounded 36 railway wagons containing an estimated 29,000 bags of cement being imported by Kawena, according to the O Pais newspaper. Due to a lack of proper documentation the customs office is treating the case as fraud. The shipment is valued at US$0.12m and duties of US$74,500 should have been paid on it. Kawena says it has the documentation for the consignment, according to the Mozambique News Agency.

Algeria: Lafarge Algeria says it plans to focus on exports and roads in 2018. Serge Dubois, director of public relations at the company, said that it intends to export 5Mt or 30% of the market by 2020, according to the El Watan newspaper. The cement producer has already conducted seven export operations since Decemebr 2017 to West Africa. The other priority is to encourage the use of cement in local infrastructure, incuding road expansion plans.

Estonia: Kunda Nordic Tsement plans to spend Euro2.2m on upgrades to its operations. The investment will be used for emission improvements, updating its plant’s power distribution system, starting to use clinker dust in cement grinding and dredging the port of Kunda, according to the Virumaa Teataja newspaper.

The subsidiary of Germany’s HeidelbergCement increased its output of clinker and cement by 20% and 60% respectively in 2017. Its plant relaunched its second kiln in 2017 but this increased its CO₂ emissions. It produced 1081kg of CO₂ per ton of clinker compared to the European target of 766kg. The plant operates two wet process kilns but it plans to switch to a dry production process in the future as this would help it reduce its emissions.

HeidelbergCement holds a 75% stake in the company with the rest belonging to Ireland’s CRH.

Sri Lanka: Insee Cement’s new grinding plant at Galle is scheduled to be completed in August 2018. Chairman Paul Hugentobler said that the company had spent US$50m on the project, with US$5m of this total on environmental features, according to the Daily News newspaper. The 0.45Mt/yr mill is being supplied by Germany’s Loesche. It will grind clinker and granulated blast furnace slag into Portland Limestone Cement and Portland Slag Cement (PSC) with a throughput of up to 60t/hr.

India: The Supreme Court has said that the final sale of Binani Cement cannot complete without its approval. It added that no decision on the sale will now be made until at least early July 2018. However, it has allowed the debt resolution process to continue, according to the Press Trust of India. UltraTech Cement and Dalmia Bharat have both made bids for the bankrupt cement producer but they have fought each other legally over the process.

Philippines: Phinma Corporation has secured a US$16.7m loan for its cement business, PhilCement, to build a terminal at Mariveles in Bataan. The five-year fixed term loan agreement was signed with Security Bank on 1 June 2018, according to Business World. PhilCement was set up in September 2017. Phinma Corporation owns a 85.7% stake in the business.

South Korea: Ssangyong Cement plans to install a waste heat recovery (WHR) unit at its Donghae plant in Gangwon. The upgrade will be operational by August 2018, according to the Maeil Business Newspaper. The new unit is expected to save the cement producer about 33% of its electricity costs or US$24m/yr.

The investment is the largest that the cement producer’s owner Hahn & Company has approved since it took control. The WHR will work with an energy storage system (ESS) that was installed in March 2018. The ESS saves power consumption by storing energy during the night and then using it during the day. The 22MWhr storage system is power by powered by 2880 batteries. The company said that it would save it at least US$2.4m/yr.

Ssangyong Cement’s Donghae plant is one of the largest in the world with a cement production capacity of 11.2Mt/yr across seven production lines. It occupies an areas of 11.3MM².

Canada: NovaAlgoma Cement Carriers (NACC) has bought a 25% stake in JT Cement. It joins Norway’s KGJ Cement Holdings (KGJ) and Sweden’s Erik Thun (Thun) in ownership of the cement company, which operates a fleet of seven smaller specialised pneumatic cement carriers. The investment is intended to expand NACC's global footprint into the Northern European market where KGJ and Thun have a strong presence. The daily operations of the JT Cement fleet will not change as a result of the NACC investment, with the vessels continuing to be commercially managed by KGJ's office in Bergen, Norway.

"This investment will allow us to each apply our experience and knowledge in the pneumatic cement carrier market to create additional shipping solutions to meet the needs of customers," said Ken Bloch Soerensen, president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Algoma Central Corporation. NovaAlgoma Cement Carriers is a 50/50 joint venture company between Algoma Central Corporation and Luxembourg’s Nova Marine Holding.

In January 2016 Nova Marine Carriers and Algoma Central Corporation created NovaAlgoma Cement Carriers. The fleet comprises pneumatic cement carriers that utilise a compressor and pump system to load and unload cement powder.

Algoma Central Corporation operates a fleet of dry and liquid bulk carriers on the Great Lakes and St Lawrence Waterway, including self-unloading dry-bulk carriers, gearless dry-bulk carriers and product tankers. Algoma also owns ocean self-unloading dry-bulk vessels operating in international markets.