Spain/Norway: A team from Cartagen Polytechnic and Ostfold University College has demonstrated that Cementos La Cruz could reduce the cost of its concrete production by Euro1.45/m3, or Euro29,000/month by curing concrete with captured CO₂. EuropaPress has reported that the use of CO₂ would reduce the amount of cement required by 7 – 8%. This in turn would remove an estimated 4.6% of CO₂ from the concrete’s production.

India: UltraTech Cement says that it will commission a total of 1.2Mt/yr-worth of additional cement capacity in Eastern India throughout October 2021. The company invested US$53.1m in the new infrastructure.

India: Rating agency ICRA has forecast that Indian cement production will rise by 12% year-on-year to 332Mt in 2022. It said that pent-up pre-Covid-19 lockdown demand, rural housing demand and a pickup in infrastructure activity would drive the rise. ICRA predicted that demand would rise by a further 8% year-on-year to 358Mt.

In the first quarter of the 2022 financial year, domestic rose by 44% year-on-year and by 2% compared to the first quarter of the 2020 financial year to 142Mt. ICRA estimated that the top 12 Indian cement producers will record their highest ever average operating profit per tonne of cementitious material in the 2022 financial year. It said that this is likely to occur due to an increase in net sales realisation and cost optimisation measures.

Spain: The eruption of the La Cumbre Vieja volcano has destroyed a concrete plant on La Palma in the Canary Islands after engulfing it with lava. EuroNews has reported that the eruption, which begun on 19 September 2021, has displaced 6000 people on the island. The La Cumbre Vieja volcano previously erupted in 1971.

Greece: Titan Cement has signed the Science-Based Targets Initiative (SBTi)’s Business Ambition for 1.5°C pledge. In so doing, it joins the UN’s Race to Zero campaign for collaboration towards a global zero-CO₂ future. The Group’s decarbonisation plans consist of an increased reliance on alternative fuel (AF), accelerated energy efficiency improvement efforts and a shift to low-carbon products and processes.

Titan Cement said “Through the participation in European and international consortia, as well as through collaborations in research and development projects, Titan will continue to develop low-carbon cementitious products and pilot carbon capture technologies in its plants, actively contributing to the industry’s ambition for a carbon-neutral future.”

In the two and a half years since Calix brought together cement producers across corporate and national boundaries to form the first Low Emissions Intensity Lime And Cement (LEILAC-1) consortium and commissioned a carbon capture installation at the Lixhe cement plant in Belgium on 10 May 2019, carbon capture and storage (CCS) has passed some major milestones. New installations have made Global Cement headlines from Canada (at Lehigh Cement’s Edmonton plant in November 2019) to China (at a China National Building Material (CNBM) plant in July 2021). Twelve other European cement plants now host current or planned carbon capture trials – including the first full-scale system, at HeidelbergCement’sBrevik plant in Norway. A second Calix-led project in Germany, LEILAC-2, attracted Euro16m-worth of funding from the European Union in April 2020.

The work of LEILAC-1 – backed by HeidelbergCement, Cemex, Lhoist, Tarmac and others, with Euro12m in funding – set the benchmark in innovation. Its pilot plant successfully captured 100% of 'unavoidable' process emissions by indirectly heating raw materials inside a vertical steel tube. Called direct capture, the model removes a CO₂ separation step, as our subsequent price analysis will reflect.

In October 2021, the LEILAC-1 consortium published its report of the concluded Lixhe trial. It described the three-fold key successes of the study:

1) Both limestone and raw meal may be processed;

2) CO₂ is successfully separated;

3) The energy penalty for indirect calcination is not higher than for conventional direct calcination.

Additionally, Calix’s first departure into the cement sector has demonstrated that its model exhibits no operational deterioration, does not suffer from material build-up and has no impact on the host plant when used in cement production. The plant’s clinker capacity remained the same as before the trial. Most importantly of all, the Lixhe cement plant recorded no process safety incidents throughout the duration of the trial.

The study has also put an evidence-based price tag on industrial-scale CCS at a cement plant for the first time: Euro36.84/t. Figure 1 (below) plots the full-cycle costs of three different carbon capture installations at retrofitted 1Mt/yr cement plants using 100% RDF, including projections for transport and storage. Installation 1 is an amine-based carbon capture system of the kind installed in the Brevik cement plant’s exhaust stack; Installation 2 is the Calix direct capture system and Installation 3 consists of both systems in combination. Direct capture’s costs are the lowest, while the amine retrofit and the combination installation are close behind at Euro43.68/t and Euro43.25/t respectively.

Figure 1: Full-cycle costs of three different carbon capture installations at retrofitted 1Mt/yr cement plants using 100% RDF

Installations 1 and 3 both entail additional energy requirements for the separation of CO₂ from flue gases and air. With the inclusion of the CO₂ produced thereby, the cost of Installation 1 rises to Euro94/t of net CO₂ emissions eliminated, more than double that of Installation 2 at Euro38.21/t. The combination of the two in Installation 3 costs Euro67.3/t, 76% more than direct capture alone. Figure 2 (below), breaks down the carbon avoidance costs for each one and compares them.

Figure 2: Carbon avoidance costs of three different carbon capture installations at retrofitted 1Mt/yr cement plants using 100% RDF

The Global Cement and Concrete Association (GCCA)’s seven-point Roadmap to Net Zero strategy puts CCS at the forefront of concrete sector decarbonisation. CCS is expected to eliminate an increasing share of global concrete’s CO₂ emissions, rising to 36% in 2050 – by then 1.37Bnt of a total 3.81Bnt. This will depend on affordability. Calix’s model has reduced the capital expenditure (CAPEX) of a carbon capture retrofit by 72% to Euro34m from Euro98m for the amine-based equivalent. When built as part of a new plant, the CAPEX further lowers to Euro27m. Both models may also be retrofitted together, for Euro99m. In future, Calix expects to install direct capture systems capable ofachieving Euro22/t of captured CO₂. By contrast, the cost of emitting 1t of CO₂ in the EU on 11 October 2021 was Euro59.15.

In what it calls the Decade to Deliver, the GCCA aims to achieve a 25% CO₂ emissions reduction in global concrete production between 2020 and 2030, in which CCS plays only a minor part of less than 5%. LEILAC-1 presents a visionof affordable carbon avoidance which complements cement companies’ 2030 CO₂ reduction aspirations.

Unlike conventional CCS methods, however, direct capture only does two thirds of a job – eliminating the emissions of calcination, but not combustion. This would appear to make it unsuited to cement’s longer-term aim of carbon neutrality by 2050 in line with the Paris Climate Accords’ 2°C warming scenario. On the other hand, direct capture is not designed to work alone. Calix recommends use of the technology in conjunction with a decarbonised fuel stream to eliminate the plant’s remaining direct emissions. This increases the price - by 47% to Euro56.05/t of CO₂ avoided for biomassand by more than double to Euro104.48/t for an E-kiln.

The Lixhe cement plant’s carbon capture story is one of a successful crossover from one industry into another: Calix previously applied the technology in the Australian magnesite sector. Realisation of the Calix carbon capture vision in the global cement industry is a challenge primarily due to the scale of the task. It will require continued collaboration between companies and with partners outside of the industry. Further than this, parliaments must continue to enact legislation to make emission mitigation the economic choice for producers.

Australia: AdBri has appointed its chief executive officer (CEO) Nick Miller to its board of directors by making him managing director and CEO. The company said that the move “reaffirms a unified strategic direction set by the board.” It added that, following the appointment in early October 2021, the board would no longer comprise a majority of independent directors as contemplated by the Board Charter or the Board Governance Framework introduced in March 2019, which included an updated Board Protocol – Potential Conflicts and Interests. However, AdBri said that it remained committed to a majority independent board and was looking for an additional independent non-executive director to restore the former makeup of the board.

Miller became the CEO of AdBri in 2019. In 2020 the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) approved Barro Group to buy a 43% stake in AdBri.

US: The Portland Cement Association (PCA) has published a roadmap to carbon neutrality for the cement and concrete sectors by 2050. It says that the strategy document demonstrates how the US cement and concrete industry, along with its entire value chain, can address climate change, decrease greenhouse gases and eliminate barriers that are restricting environmental progress. It added that the document is a ‘major step’ towards engaging US policymakers, industry partners and non-government organisations.

“Cement and concrete have been pivotal in building resilient, durable and sustainable communities that enable people to live safe, productive and healthy lives via structures that withstand natural and man-made disasters,” said PCA President and chief executive officer, Michael Ireland. “The PCA is uniquely positioned to lead the industry-wide ambition to achieving carbon neutrality and enable our member companies and industry partners to continue building a better future.”

The PCA’s roadmap outlines a number of reduction strategies across the various phases of the built environment including production at cement plants, construction including designing and building and everyday infrastructure in use. It also recognises five main areas of opportunity: clinker; cement; concrete; construction; and carbonation (using concrete as a carbon sink).

Notably goals include a reduction of coal and petcoke use at cement plants to 10% in 2050 from 60% at present, a clinker ratio of 75% in 2050 from 90% at present and a reduction of the CO₂ intensity of concrete of 60% by 2050. The roadmap also noted the necessity of carbon capture and storage/utilisation (CCUS) for reducing CO₂ emissions from cement production. However is pointed out that there are no commercial-scale CCUS installations at any cement plant within the US, location and permitting challenges remained and that infrastructure investment would be required to deal with the captured CO2.

Kenya: A report by the National Independent Clinker Verification Committee has found that the country has a clinker shortage of up to 3.3Mt/yr. It added that 59% of the imported clinker to compensate for this originates from Egypt without any tariffs, according to the East African newspaper. The committee was originally set up by the government in response to lobbying from industry to increase the duty on imported clinker to 25% from 10% at present. However, the committee also reported that Egypt has benefited from a free trade agreement. Local producers are divided against the proposal to raise tariffs on clinker as some of them reply on imports.

The report found that 3.8Mt of clinker was produced locally in 2020 against a demand of 5.3Mt. Local producers were reported to have been operating at a 65% capacity utilisation rate. Egypt and the UAE accounted for 92% of all clinker imports with a further 7% supplied by Saudi Arabia.

South Africa: The National Treasury has banned the use of imported cement on all government-funded projects from 4 November 2021. The new rules require all tender invitations to use locally produced cement, made from locally sourced raw materials, according to the Business Day newspaper. Trade body Cement and Concrete SA has welcomed the move. The decision follows lobbying by the cement industry to impose tariffs on imported cement.