Costa Rica: Société Générale de Surveillance has awarded Holcim Costa Rica its Positive Packaging certificate for 100% packaging energy recovery in 2021. The company offset the 1500t carbon footprint of its packaging production for the year by sorting and co-processing 14,000t of paper as fuel. It sourced the paper from its customer cement bag return scheme and through municipal recycling services run by fellow Holcim subsidiary Geocycle Costa Rica.

Holcim Costa Rica sustainability coordinator Catalina Mora said “Waste management is a global challenge, so this project has a direct impact on our contribution as a company to the vision of sustainability for the country.”

India: UltraTech Cement has commissioned the new 2Mt/yr Line 2 of its Bara grinding plant in Uttar Pradesh. The additional capacity will help the company to serve the growing Central Indian cement market. Its total installed capacity is now 115Mt/yr, up by 2.9% year-on-year from 111Mt.

UltraTech Cement says that the Bara grinding plant, which opened in January 2020, operated at 80% capacity utilisation in the 2020 financial year.

China: Saudi Aramco and China Building Materials Academy (CBMA) have launched the Nonmetallic Excellence and Innovation Center (NEXCEL) in Beijing. The centre will leverage CBMA's expertise and resources to promote the development and application of nonmetallic technologies offering superior lifecycle cost, efficiency and environmental performance to metal-based alternatives in Chinese construction.

Saudi Aramco’s senior vice president of technical services Ahmad Al-Sa'adi said “We are excited to be part of this important initiative with CBMA, to jointly advance the use of nonmetallics in building and construction in China. At Aramco, we have been developing and deploying nonmetallic solutions within our own operations for more than 20 years as they offer superior lifecycle cost, efficiency and environmental advantages over their metal alternatives.”

Nepal: Huaxin Cement Narayani has ignited the kiln at its 1Mt/yr Dhading cement plant in Bagmati. Construction of the project started in 2019 but it was delayed by flooding, disputes over land ownership and the emergence of the coronavirus pandemic. China-based Huaxin Cement originally signed an agreement with the Investment Board Nepal in 2018 to build the plant for US$140m.