Global Cement News

Denmark: FLSmidth says it will lead CO₂Valorize, a new consortium intended to develop and deploy carbonation technologies in the cement industry. The group will receive Euro2m from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Doctoral Networks and is supported by the European Commission’s Horizon Europe initiative. The expected commercial and technical outcomes of the consortium include a full flow sheet of the carbonation process line, the techno-economic analysis of various technology and materials options, and the optimisation of FLSmidth's proprietary reactors. The project is also intended to be a key part of FLSmidth MissionZero programme.

Burcin Temel McKenna, Head of Green Cement Solutions Development at FLSmidth, said “We have been granted a unique opportunity to revolutionise the cement industry at a time of extreme urgency”. He added, “On-site carbon capture and utilisation projects will be a quicker and more economically viable way forward for in cement plants.”

The consortium includes the following partners: Norwegian University of Science and Technology; Karlsruhe Institute of Technology; HZDR Innovation with Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf and Technische Universität Dresden; Technical University of Denmark; University of Padova; Siemens Process Systems Engineering; and the Slovakia-based cement producer Cemmac. The partners will support eight fully funded PhD students conducting research into the characterisation and kinetics of carbonated materials and optimisation of the carbonation process. They will also explore the commercial opportunities for mineral carbonation. The focus will be on the carbonation of calcium-, aluminium-, and magnesium-silicates as well as cement derivatives, slag, fly ash, recycled concrete fines and mine tailings.

Philippines: Cemex Philippines says that it was the sole supplier of cement for the construction of the Cordova Link Expressway, the longest bridge in the country. It supplied nearly 70,000t of cement for the project. It connects Cebu City to the municipality of Cordova on Mactan Island and spans a total of 8.9km standing on twin tower pylons reaching 145m in height. The bridge opened to road traffic in 2022.

Pakistan: Bestway Cement’s turnover grew by 21% year-on-year to US$460m in the financial year to 30 June 2022 from US$380m in the same period in 2021. Its operating profit rose by 32% to US$85.4m from US$64.4m. Its cost of sales increases by 23% to US$221m from US$180m.

Cembureau called for urgent action on electricity prices from European governments this week to protect cement plants. Its maths was crushingly simple. One tonne of cement takes around 110kWh of electricity to produce. Electricity prices started to top Euro700mWh in some European Union (EU) countries at the end of August 2022. The association says that this represents added costs of Euro70/t of cement and a tripling of the total cost of production. This kind of sudden extra cost to cement production could lead to the widespread closure of cement plants and lead to chaos in the construction supply chain.

Previously, Cembureau reported in 2020 that electricity accounts for about 12% of a cement plant’s energy mix. In a dry production process plant 43% of this is used for cement grinding, 25% goes into raw material preparation, another 25% on clinker production and the final portion is typically used for raw material extraction, fuel grinding and for packing and loading. However, the cost of the electricity can make a big difference to the overall energy bill for a cement plant. When a report by the European Commission’s (EC) Joint Research Centre (JRC) modelled a reference northern European cement plant with a production capacity of 1.0Mt/yr back in 2016, it concluded that the EU cement industry was spending around half of its energy costs on electricity compared to smaller ratios at plants in China, Egypt, Algeria and... Ukraine. That last country in the list is poignant given its unwitting participation in the current energy crisis. One other thing to note is that cement producers, as large scale users, may well be paying less than the wholesale prices Cembureau appears to be quoting.

The timing of Cembureau’s proclamation is pertinent because the EU and individual states have mostly been waiting until the autumn before revealing their energy support plans. However, the dilemma for Cembureau, and other industry lobbying groups, is how to protect their sectors whilst domestic consumers are threatened. The aftermath of the coronavirus lockdowns has shown what can happen when production of key commodities stops: supply chain disruption, shortages and price rises. One ironic shortage in the UK during the lockdown periods was that of CO₂, as high gas prices forced the main producer to shut down, leading to unexpected knock-on problems along the supply chain in areas such as food production. The same situation is reportedly at risk of happening again now too.

Cembureau’s wider solution is to link domestic and industrial consumers of electricity. So, some of its suggestions to policymakers are to use all available means of power generation, implement emergency measures such as price caps immediately, change the rules of the electricity market more generally to prevent future price shocks and to promote large scale renewable power source development. These are all things that could help both individual and industrial users of electricity.

Compare and contrast, then, with the MPA’s (Mineral Products Association) approach to the same problem in the UK. Its strategy instead has been to ask the UK government for tax cuts and freezes and to hurry along the forthcoming policy on support for Energy Intensive Industries. That’s not to say that Cembureau’s suggestions don’t also include some sector specific requests. It has asked that the EU temporary state aid framework adopted in late March 2022 should allow all energy intensive industries to have access to state aid covering 70 - 80% of eligible costs. It has also encouraged the wider use of alternative fuels, although it doesn’t link the reason why beyond reducing imports of fossil fuels. Lastly, it bangs the drum for its recent preoccupation, the EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, this time adding electro-intensity as a main criterion for eligibility for compensation under EU emission trading scheme (ETS) indirect state aid guidelines.

Government support packages for the energy crisis are starting to be announced in European countries but the question for everyone is whether they and other actions will be enough. One problem for the cement industry will be simply staying on the radar of policy makers facing a crisis looming over their citizens. Yet if there is not enough energy to go around then rationing of some kind will be inevitable and heavy industrial users will be the first obvious targets to be told to cut back. Some months later building material supply shortages will hit. One national cement sector to watch in the coming months may be the Spanish one as it has long warned of the risks of high electricity prices.

UK: Tarmac has appointed Craig Kirkland as the plant manager of Tarmac’s integrated Dunbar plant in Scotland. Kirkland first started working for the subsidiary of Ireland-based CRH in the mid-1990s as its Landfill & Recycling Manager. He later became its Commercial Manager in 2015 before becoming the Head of Transformation at the Dunbar plant in 2021.