US: Lehigh Hanson has signed a collaboration agreement with materials technology company Fortera. Under the agreement, the companies will establish a carbon capture and storage (CCS) system at the producer’s 0.8Mt/yr integrated Redding Cement plant in Shasta district, California. The system will produce a cementitious material for use in concrete production. The material will be the first of its kind to be produced at a cement plant.

"This collaboration with Lehigh Hanson will prove the commercial scalability, the quality of the final product, and the competitive economics of the Fortera process," said Ryan Gilliam, chief executive officer and co-founder of Fortera. He added that the Fortera process (ReCarb) has been designed to utilise the existing cement infrastructure, from the quarry to the kiln, but with less CO₂ emissions, lower energy, and lower processing temperatures, leading to 60% lower CO₂ emissions per tonne of product.

Japan: Taiheiyo Cement plans to set up a Carbon Neutral Technology Development Project Team in April 2021. The team will develop and apply carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies for installation at the producer’s cement kilns. The company said that the team seeks to develop cost-practical product for industrial application. Following on from this, it plans to develop CCS technologies which make use of other cement plant processes, and which integrates the circular economic use of industrial by-products. Carbon neutrality is the ultimate aim.

The group said, “By establishing a new project team that is a cross-company organisation, we will gather our wisdom and realise carbon neutrality. We will strongly promote the development of innovative technologies for this purpose.”

South Africa: Several of South Africa’s cement and concrete producers have united to form a joint industry association called Cement & Concrete SA (CCSA). The association consolidates the former Association of Cementitious Materials Producers (ACMP), Concrete Society of Southern Africa (CSSA) and The Concrete Institute (TCI). It said that it aims to create long-term shared value and industry growth in South Africa through driving collaboration, skills development, innovation, and the highest standards in sustainable cement and concrete materials and products.

Chief executive officer Bryan Perrie said, “At a time when many conflicting and ambiguous messages are shared readily on various platforms, and with the proliferation of substandard products and services, the need for authoritative engagement with all stakeholders is critical.” He added, “We are excited about the future of the cement and concrete industry in South Africa. The staff of CCSA are ready to discuss membership options and benefits. We are poised to add value and unlock opportunities for all members, and the industry at large.”

US: The Market Intelligence Group at the Portland Cement Association (PCA) has made an additional update to its Winter 2020 – 2021 economic forecast. Senior vice president and chief economist Ed Sullivan revised the association’s assessments regarding the path of Covid-19, vaccine supply, government Covid-19 relief and inflationary pressures.

The association said that it expects domestic cement consumption to grow by nearly 1% in 2021, fuelled largely by residential construction. It estimated ‘weak’ non-residential construction performance, with soft economic activity affecting government funds at federal state level. It added that the new federal government Covid-19 relief targeting state government would likely limit public cement’s drag on 2021 cement consumption growth.

US: Kespry says that Cemex USA is using its drone and software product for stockpile management at its operations. A Cemex representative said that it has mapped 74,500ha of land over more than 4000 drone missions using Kespry’s product. The supplier uses autonomous aerial drones to gather survey data and then uses machine learning techniques to analyse the results.

Director of aggregate resources Matt Lewis said, “Kespry plays a critical role at both our cement and aggregates sites, despite operations being significantly different. Since initially adopting Kespry, we have been able to measure 21,100 stockpiles across our aggregates sites, while also collecting massive amounts of topographic data into the Kespry Cloud across our cement sites. The amount of time and money the Kespry platform has saved us is unmatched, and we wouldn’t be able to operate at this level if it weren’t for Kespry.”

Kazakhstan: Denmark-based FLSmidth has announced the opening of its new ‘Service Supercenter’ in Karagandy, Qaraghandy region. The service centre has a focus on mining, but will also serve cement customers with equipment delivery, component maintenance and rapid on-site service backed by local support. The centre consists of a 2500m² warehouse and 1200m² workshop, as well as a customer service office, customer training centre and other support facilities.

Mining president Mikko Keto said, “The main concept of the Supercenter is to get closer to our mining and cement customers across Kazakhstan and Central Asia and support them with the best solutions, fast access to spare and wear parts, and, of course, local knowhow and expertise. This move supports FLSmidth’s ever-growing focus on customer service and aftermarket.”

Switzerland: Sika has developed ReCO2ver, a process which produces limestone, sand and gravel from the combination of concrete and CO₂ with an additive developed by the supplier. The process enables demolition companies to completely recycle used concrete, while storing captured CO₂ at a rate of 60kg/t of crushed concrete. The materials produced can be used as aggregates to make concrete of comparable strength to an all-new product.

Chief executive officer Paul Schuler said, "The five largest European Union countries alone generate roughly 300Mt/yr of old concrete. With complete recycling of these materials, up to 15Mt/yr of CO₂ emissions can be stored. We are convinced that our new process has the potential to benefit both our customers and the environment."

Many Saudi Arabian cement producers have reported increased annual sales and profits in recent weeks. Southern Province Cement’s sales revenue rose by 27% year-on-year to US$440m in 2020 from US$347m in 2019. Net Profit after zakat and tax increased to US$162m from US$123m. Other producers enjoyed similar boosts. The reason can be seen in the country’s domestic cement sales. They rose by 21% year-on-year to 51Mt in 2020 from 42Mt in 2019. After a promising start to the year the coronavirus pandemic hit local production hard in the second quarter of 2020. However, it nearly doubled year-on-year in June 2020 and kept up the pace thereafter.

Graph 1: Domestic cement sales in Saudi Arabia, 2010 – 2020. Source: Yamama Cement.

Graph 1 above puts the cement sales in 2020 into context over the last decade. Sales hit a high in 2015 but then started to wane as infrastructure spending dried up due to lower oil prices and decreased government spending. A ban on exporting cement was subsequently relaxed but the general market appeared to adapt to the new situation. This changed significantly in 2020 with analysts attributing the turnaround to programs organised by the Ministry of Housing. This growth has carried into 2021 with NCB Capital forecasting an increase of 3.5% in local cement sales in 2021 due to the ongoing housing programs, the country’s so-called ‘Giga’ projects and investment by its sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund (PIF), as part of its 2021 - 2025 strategy. They reported that demand created by the country’s large-scale projects began to be felt along the supply chain in the fourth quarter of 2020 and associated contracts have started to be issued.

To give an example of the scale of some of these schemes, one of the proposed giga projects is to build a new city called Neom from scratch near the Red Sea coast. The resulting conurbation is intended to showcase new technologies and diversify the Saudi Arabian economy away from hydrocarbons. It has a price tag of US$500bn. An airport was built in 2019 and a next step was announced in January 2021, introducing a 160km linear city without roads called ‘The Line.’ Doubtless it will require lots of cement to realise the dream in whatever forms it happens to end up taking.

The wider picture here is that global oil prices hit a low in April 2020 as coronavirus lockdowns triggered a worldwide drop in demand although they then started to recover. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that Saudi Arabia’s gross domestic product fell by just under 4% in 2020. In response the PIF has upped its investment in the local economy including in the ‘Giga’ projects like Neom. There has been scepticism internationally about whether these projects will progress any further beyond press releases and actually get built. However, the cement producers’ financial results, cement sales figures and reporting from analysts like NCB Capital show that some investment is happening and it’s having results. The sector still faces a battle against overcapacity. It had a production utilisation rate of just under 70% despite the increase in cement production in 2020. Yet cement producers in Saudi Arabia have done well. While the Saudi Arabian government continues to spend on infrastructure in order to rebalance its economy this looks set to continue.

UK: HeidelbergCement subsidiary Hanson has appointed Michael Wildmore as the technical development manager for its cement business. He holds over 30 years’ experience in senior technical and quality management roles in the building materials industry, according to Construction Index.

Wildmore joined Hanson UK, part of the HeidelbergCement, as a technical sales advisor in January 2020 having previously spent five years with Tarmac, latterly as technical manager at Tarmac Building Products. Before that, he worked for 20 years with Redland and subsequently Lafarge and LafargeHolcim after acquisitions and mergers. He is an associate member of the Institute of Concrete Technology and is on technical committees of the Mineral Products Association (MPA).

Russia: Siberian Cement Holding Company (SibCem) has appointed Andrey Rubtsov as its marketing director. He was previously the general director of Iskitimcement, a subsidiary of SibCem. Rubtsov holds a degree in management from the Novosibirsk State University of Economics and Management and a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the Management College of Southern Africa (MANCOSA). He has worked in the cement industry since 2001.