Global Cement News

Vietnam/Australia: Vietnam exported 412,000t of cement to Australia during the first 10 months of 2023. Việt Nam News has reported that this is more than double the 10-month 2022 figure of 157,000t. The total value of the shipments also more than doubled year-on-year, to US$20.5m from US$8.37m.

Germany: Flender claimed the German Sustainability Award 2024 for mechanical engineering at a ceremony in Düsseldorf on 23 November 2023. The award recognises the outstanding contribution of the supplier’s drives for wind energy and industrial applications, including cement, to the German energy transition. Germany is committed to 80% renewable energy use nationally by 2030, and 100% by 2035.

CEO Andreas Evertz said "My sincerest thanks go to the Flender team and our partners. This award is a very special milestone for us. It is a testament to the passion and commitment of our global team in tackling these critical challenges. Furthermore, it serves as additional inspiration and motivation towards our ambitious objectives. Ultimately, the awards themselves are secondary to the meaningful achievements we attain together. The industry has a duty to take the lead in addressing the climate, environmental and social challenges."

Chile/Germany: The governments of Chile and Germany are reportedly preparing to launch a so-called ‘climate club’ to help developing nations invest in technologies to decarbonise sectors such as cement and steel production. The partners will set up a platform to connect countries with funding and technical support from governments and the private sector, according to a draft statement seen by Reuters. The statement is expected to be published at the United Nations’ Conference of the Parties (COP) 28 event on 1 December 2023 set to take place in Dubai.

"On hard-to-abate sectors, starting with steel and cement, we will advance conducive policy frameworks for accelerating decarbonisation," the statement said. It added that this will include attempting to coordinate international green industry standards, such as counting the emissions in industrial products.

A website for the club lists 33 members including the US, Argentina, Australia, Canada, Colombia, Egypt, the European Union (EU), Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Mozambique, Morocco, Ukraine and the UK. It has been viewed, in part, as an attempt to reconcile countries annoyed by the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), which started in October 2023. However, neither China nor India appears to have joined the ‘climate club’ so far.

Algeria: Amouda Cement is preparing to launch an oil well cement production line at its plant at El Beïda in Laghouat province. L'Expression newspaper reports that the product will be targeted at oil and gas companies in the southern region of the country, particularly those near to the RN 1 highway.

Denmark: Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark will today inaugurate the ConsenCUS CO₂ capture pilot unit at Aalborg Portland Cement’s Rørdal plant. Kadri Simson, the European Union (EU) Energy Commissioner, and Lars Aagaard, the Danish Minister for Climate, Energy and Supply Minister, will also attend the event. A European Commission-run carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) forum will take place in Aalborg at the same time.

Aalborg Portland Cement first established a CCUS pilot project called CORT at its cement plant in 2022 in collaboration with the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) with support from the EU Innovation Fund. This is now being replaced by the ConsenCUS pilot. The new project will test a more energy-efficient CCS technology that can potentially halve the energy consumption compared to traditional CO₂ capture methods by driving the process exclusively via electricity. The project partners will also investigate converting the captured CO₂ into potassium formate, a valuable resource for the chemical industry. The ConsenCUS project is supported by the EU's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program.