US: Ozinga has broken ground on a 1Mt/yr alternative cement grinding plant in East Chicago, Indiana. The plant is equipped with a Gebr. Pfeiffer MVR5300-C6 vertical roller mill. It will produce ASTM C989-compliant slag cement and other blended cements. When operational in 2026, it will be the largest of its kind in North America, and avoid 700,000t/yr of CO₂ emissions from conventional cement production. Its location offers strategic rail, road and shipping access to large markets in the US and Canada.
East Chicago Mayor Anthony Copeland welcomed an anticipated 150 new jobs resulting from construction and subsequent operations at the plant.
UK: Clay brick and concrete products producer Ibstock is seeking an industrial partner for a ‘major’ calcined clay cement plant in the UK.
The group has identified a large reserve of high-kaolin clay at one of its operating brick clay quarries in central England. The site is a fully-consented quarry, with sufficient calcinable material to support calcined clay production for more than 25 years. ‘Extensive’ drilling and industrial trials have been completed to confirm the reserves and the reactivity of the calcined clay for use in low-carbon cement production.
Ibstock says that is looking at an industrial partner to collaborate on the design, construction and commercialisation of the project. It is open to exploring optimal investment and partnership models to fully realise the potential of the site.
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India: ACC Chair Karan Adani says that he expects the cement industry to benefit from the an anticipated US$2.2tn in new public infrastructure spending between 2025 and 2030.
Press Trust of India News has reported that Adani said "ACC crossed the 100Mt/yr cement capacity milestone in April 2025, propelling us closer to our ambitious 140Mt/yr target by the 2028 financial year." The company’s capacity corresponds to 15% of an all-India installed capacity of 686Mt/yr.
Grupo Gloria to build Lima lime plant
Peru: Grupo Gloria plans to invest US$100m in an upcoming lime plant in Lima. OneStone Consulting has reported that the plant will supply lime for Lima’s construction, agriculture and mining sectors.
Grupo Gloria subsidiary Cal & Cemento Sur already operates a five-kiln lime plant in Puno Region with five kilns, comprising three Maerz Parallel Flow Regeneration (PFR) vertical kilns and two horizontal kilns.
Shree Cement achieves 16% premium cement sales in fourth quarter of 2025 financial year
India: During the fourth quarter of the 2025 financial year (which ended on 31 March 2025), premium products constituted 16% of Shree Cement’s sales mix, up from 12% one year previously. During the period, the company further diversified its offering with the launch of two new premium cements, Bangur Marble Portland slag cement and Extra White Portland slag cement, in Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal. Both products are designed for maximum brightness and smoothness within their category of CEM-II Portland slag cements. The company says that its growing portfolio helped it to increase its full-year financial realisation per tonne by 5% year-on-year.
Business Today News has reported that managing director Neeraj Akhoury said "In the 2025 financial year, 74% of our cement output was blended, avoiding over 7.2Mt of CO₂ emissions."
Shree Cement crossed 60% consumption of energy from renewable sources in May 2025, Construction World News has reported. It has 582MW of installed renewable power capacity and is currently in the process of building a 1MW battery storage system at one of its cement plants in India.
Blended cement export hub for Taiheiyo Cement
Japan: Taiheiyo Cement has announced that it will expand the export of blended cement through the establishment of a new facility at its Saiki Ash Centre in Saiki City, Oita Prefecture. Taiheiyo Cement says that the facility, which will meet growing demand for blended cement in South East Asia, is part of its sustainability strategy. The blended cement will use fly ash from domestic coal-fired power plants.
The new facility will expand Taiheiyo Cement’s blended cement export capacity from 0.8Mt/yr to 1.3Mt/yr.
Cement production falls in Indonesia
Indonesia: Cement production fell by 7.4% in Indonesia during the first quarter of 2025, falling from 14.5Mt in 2024 to 13.4Mt in 2025, according to data from the Indonesian Cement Association (ASI). March 2025 was particularly low compared to the year prior, with sales for the month falling by 21.6% to 3.8Mt. The nation’s capacity utilisation rate was estimated at just 57%.
Regionally, the steepest decline was seen in Kalimantan, where sales for the first quarter of 2025 were 21.8% lower than in the same period of 2024. Sales in Bali and Nusa Tenggara fell by 15.2%, while Sulawesi saw a decline of 13.9%. The decrease in Kalimantan was due in part to the slower development of projects in the new capital city Nusantara, as the government has slowed down spending on the project.
More widely, ASI chairman Lilik Unggul Raharjo attributed the national contraction in cement sales to weaker household spending, as well as slower infrastructure construction. He projected continued pressure on the cement industry throughout the rest of 2025, driven by global economic uncertainty and excess production capacity.
Raharjo also pointed to global policies to reduce carbon emissions as another burden on the industry, citing Australia's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), which is set to take effect in 2027. The policy will require a carbon tax to be paid on products with emissions that exceed a set limit, which could disrupt clinker exports from Indonesia to Australia. These are currently in the region of 1Mt/yr.
Çimsa to invest in white cement plant
Spain: Çimsa Cementos España, a subsidiary of the Turkish group Sabancı, plans to invest €12.55m in its Buñol white cement plant close to Valencia during 2025. This will be followed by €7.1m in 2026 and €5.4m in 2027. The investments will be primarily for the development of alternative fuels, energy efficiency and new business lines. These significant investments follow €10.8m spent during 2024, when the manufacturer launched a photovoltaic installation near its plant to supply 18% of its energy needs.
PPC optimistic after steady start to 2025
South Africa: PPC’s revenues fell by 1.9% year-on-year in the 12 months to 31 March 2025, decreasing to US$560m. However, earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) surged by 28% to US$88m.
CEO Matias Cardarelli said that PPC has had to focus on internal corrections to grow its earnings and unlock underutilised value for the company. He explained that the company had performed ‘ahead’ of what it had expected for the period under review. “There was a narrative that the only problems that PPC was having were the problems connected to the economy, and the cement sector in South Africa had not grown for more than 10 years. Whereas that was not completely the case. That had a negative impact on the company,” said Cardarelli.
PPC is building a new 1.5Mt/yr plant in the North West Province with China’s Sinoma, as well as a new solar power plant in Zimbabwe as it invests further into the company at a time when the costs of electricity and other inputs are spiking. The company said that imports of cement into its regional markets were not a major worry as it was increasing its competitiveness against rival local and imported products. “In South Africa, we remain cautiously optimistic for the announcement by the new government of big infrastructure plans,” Cardarelli added.
Workers strike at CalPortland Mojave
US: More than 50 employees of the CalPortland cement plant near Mojave went on strike on 8 June 2025. A spokesperson for the workers said that it was the first strike at the location since 1981. A striking employee told local press that pay and retirement benefits are among workers’ concerns. The union's contract with the company expired in March 2025.