Displaying items by tag: Eurocement
Russia: Eurocement subsidiary Lipetskcement has announced that its CEM-II sulphate-resistant cement has been found to conform to the new Russian standard for its class of products. This enables its use in special types of construction, including hydraulic engineering, land reclamation, transport infrastructure and oil and gas wells.
Kavkazcement purchases new excavator
28 May 2020Russia: Eurocement subsidiary Kavkazcement has announced its acquisition of a Hitachi excavator for use at its clay quarry. The reasons behind the choice of excavator were its high productivity and low operating costs.
Kavkazcement director general Oleg Lopatin said, “The hydraulic excavator will develop clay reserves in areas complicated by large slopes, increasing the economic efficiency of raw material extraction and ensuring the stability of the final product. Kavkazcement systematically modernises all stages of production, which allows us to guarantee high quality and reliability of product deliveries to key construction sites in the south of Russia.”
Belgorodsky Cement opens packing and palletising line
23 April 2020Russia: Eurocement subsidiary Belgorodsky Cement has dispatched the first batch of bagged cement from the new packing and palletising line at its 3.8Mt/yr integrated plant in Belgorod West, Belgorod Oblast. The 70t/hr-capacity line produces 50kg cement bags on pallets of 1.7t (34 bags).
Eurocement has also announced the first delivery of cement from its Belgorodsky Cement plant to Yaroslavl, Tolyatti and Nizhny Novgorod by river in 2020. Eurocement senior vice president Alexander Sapronov said, “The delivery of products by river transport is one of the most cost-effective methods of transportation. High-quality loading and reliable packaging guarantee consumers complete cargo safety.”
Eurocement has continued production throughout the coronavirus outbreak, but has restricted meetings, conferences and training sessions since 23 March 2020. The Group said, “Eurocement products are strategically important to the nation's economy. In order to ensure smooth operation of production facilities and of the group as a whole, measures have been taken to minimise the risk of spreading the coronavirus.” These include: ‘regular health check-ups and temperature measurements for employees and subcontractors, air disinfection, antiseptic treatment of operational surfaces, provision of skin antiseptics in toilets and informing employees about safety recommendations.’
Russia: Eurocement subsidiary Kavkazcement has reported the successful installation of a remote monitoring system at its 3.1Mt/yr integrated Kavkazcement plant. The system uses near field communication (NFC) tags and identification devices to feed real-time operational data from its four wet kilns to smartphones. Kavkazcement CEO Oleg Lopatin said, “Accurate and timely inspection of the equipment increases the efficiency and stability of the entire cement production line. The mobile monitoring system reduces the time and improves the quality of diagnostics.”
Akhangarantsement grows 2019 production by 16% year-on-year
05 February 2020Russia: Eurocement subsidiary Akhangarantsement produced 1.9Mt of cement in 2019, a rise of 16% year-on-year from 1.6Mt in 2018. The company attributed the growth to a programme of ‘modernisation of the equipment at the Akhangarantsement aimed at increasing productivity, energy efficiency and reliability of production,’ without any disruption to supply. Akhangarantsement general director Gennady Kulikov said, “The coordinated work of the entire team allowed us to fulfil the tasks assigned to the plant with honour.”
Eurocement and PIK Group extend cooperation agreement
29 January 2020Russia: Eurocement has announced the continuation of its cooperation agreement with construction company PIK Group in 2020. The 30.7Mt/yr-capacity cement producer, Russia’s largest, sold 0.2Mt of cement to PIK Group in 2019, bringing the total volume exchanged in the course of their cooperation to 0.8Mt. Eurocement sales vice president Ilya Kosykh said, “We guarantee our customers stable cement performance and uninterrupted deliveries of building materials on time.”
Production picks up - update on Russia
08 January 2020Last month Soyuzcement, the Union of Russian Cement Producers, reported that cement production was on course to grow by 8% year-on-year to 58Mt in 2019. This estimate was based on growth from January to October 2019 followed by a modest rise in November.
Graph 1: Cement production in Russia, 2010 – 2019. Source: CM Pro, Ernst & Young.
The pickup is significant because it’s the country’s first annual resumption of growth since 2014. At that time low commodity prices, a worsening economy and international sanctions broke a fairly steady growth cycle that had started in 2000. The only blip in that run was the global economic downturn around 2008. In the medium to long term Soyuzcement’s review pinpointed growth drivers as being government-backed residential housing schemes, integrated land development projects and an increase in the construction of concrete roads. This increase has been driven by consumption growth in most regions, led by a 12% rise in the Central Federal District although the Volga Federal District started to slow in the second half of 2019.
Figure 1: Russian Federal Districts by cement production in 2016. Source: Soyuzcement.ru.
Anecdotally, this change in the fortunes of the Russian cement industry can be seen in the volume of news coverage on the Global Cement website over the last few years. The mean number of news stories on the country in 2016 and 2017, increased by half in 2018 and then again in 2019. Partly this is down to our attempts to increase our coverage of the region but it also shows a general trend. In the news specifically there haven’t been many new plant projects domestically but there has been a steady stream of upgrades and maintenance related stories. For example, Eurocement subsidiary Kavkazcement reported in recent weeks that it had installed a replacement dry kiln. This has been part of a group of upgrades that Eurocement has started in 2019. On the supplier side both Germany’s Gebr. Pfeiffer and Italy’s Bedeschi opened subsidiaries in Russia in 2019.
One thing that didn’t seem to slow down the growth were mounting tariffs on Russian exports into Ukraine. Russia’s neighbour first blocked imports of cement from Russia in May 2019 due to, what it said was a Russian ban on imports. It then followed this with an antidumping rate of 115% for imported clinker and Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) from Russia. It also penalised imports from Belarus and Moldova, although at lower rates. Russia’s cement export rates seemed untroubled by this, rising by 13.5% year-on-year to 0.8Mt in the first 10 months of 2019. Exports hit of high of just below 2Mt/yr in 2014 but have since stabilised at around 1Mt/yr. Imports reached around 5Mt/yr in the early 2010s and have been slowly declining since then, reaching 1.5Mt in 2018.
The lowered production rate that the Russian cement industry has faced over the last five years has been noteworthy given the apparent low capacity utilisation rate. The Global Cement Directory 2019 records the country as having a production capacity of 111Mt/yr. This gives Russia a capacity utilisation rate of 48% in 2018! Unlike, say, the countries in southern Europe that have had to rationalise their cement industries following the post-2008 decline, Russia may have structural aspects to the industry that have helped protect it from lower utilisation rates. These include relatively low export-import rates and the large size of the country with limited sea access to many regions. Most of its production capacity is located in the west but a sizable minority of plants are based further east across the Ural, Siberian and Far Eastern regions. Even under subdued economic conditions, plants in these places are likely to be less susceptible to foreign imports, for example.
Looking ahead, the question is whether the current growth that the cement industry is enjoying is viable once government spending slows down. Alongside this the industry could also focus on sustainability. As the government announced in early January 2020, the country expects to face both negative and positive effects from climate change. The cement industry could be at the front of this trend if it decides to clean up production and/or move into new markets as the Arctic region opens up.
Kavkazcement plant receives new kiln
02 January 2020Russia: Eurocement subsidiary Kavkazcement has installed and commissioned a dry kiln to replace its reserve kiln at its plant in the Republic of Karachay-Cherkessia. The new kiln is part of a Euro5.79m investment which will increase the current 3.1Mt/yr integrated plant’s capacity by over 40% to 4.4Mt/yr when commissioned in mid-2020. Oleg Lopatin, Kavkazcement director general, said “A significant increase in the plant’s workload was made possible by the high demand for our cements.”
Eurocement’s Akhangarancement plant upgrade to consist of 3Mt/yr capacity expansion
09 December 2019Uzbekistan: Russia’s Eurocement has revealed that construction work underway at its 2.0Mt/yr integrated Akhangarancement cement plant in Tahskent region includes the installation of a second plant on the site, bringing its total capacity to 5.0Mt/yr. Trend News Agency has reported that suppliers have delivered 4500t of machinery to Akhangarancement, including a clinker refrigerator, clinker conveyor and heat exchanger as well as electrical equipment and building materials for a raw materials warehouse. Eurocement’s total investment in the project has amounted to US$200m.
Eurocement Group Holding International president Mikhail Skorohod said, “Taking into account the growing needs of the Uzbek market in building materials, Eurocement is committed to creation of a building materials cluster based around the Akhangarancement plant.” The company said that the upgraded 5.0Mt/yr plant would become operational in 2020.
Eurocement’s Maltsovsky plant gains European cement certification
27 November 2019Russia: Eurocement’s Maltsovsky integrated plant in Bryansk Region has gained European certification for its CEMI 52.5N, CEMI 42.5R and CEMII / A-S 42.5N products. Local testing and independent certification confirmed the new designation. Following an earlier certification for CEMI 42.5N the plant now hopes to grow its exports to the European Union.