Analysis

The Polish Cement Association (SPC) has taken a swing at mounting cement imports from outside of the European Union (EU) in recent weeks. Its ‘apocalyptic’ message was underlined by the name of a seminar it participated in at the European Parliament: “Is the end of cement production in the EU approaching?” The SPC’s primary target appeared to be imports from Ukraine. It said that, “...cement imports from Ukraine - only to Poland - have increased by almost 3000% over five years (2019 - 2024). (In 2024) it amounted to more than 650,000t, and forecasts for 2025 already indicate more than 1Mt.” However, it detailed other issues affecting the sector including high energy prices, the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and decarbonisation costs such as carbon capture.

The SPC is clearly keen to find cross-country support in the EU. In its accompanying statement it said "The uncontrolled increase in imports - from Ukraine to Poland or Romania, and from Türkiye and Africa to Italy or Spain - is already directly threatening cement producers, and will only continue to rise until the full implementation of the CBAM. It shows that imports from outside the EU are not just a problem for Poland.” Representatives from the cement associations in the later countries - CIROM, AITEC and Oficemen - all added comments to the SPC statement.

The SPC has called for a customs quota on cement imports from Ukraine to Poland to be introduced. It also asked for the European Commission to extend the EU ETS indirect cost compensation scheme to include the cement sector in order to further hedge against rising energy bills. It argues that this measure is essential to keep the cement industry competitive both now and in the future. Future electricity consumption is expected to double as cement plants start to install carbon capture technology.

Graph 1: Domestic cement sales and imports in Poland, 2019 - 2024. Source: SPC, Eurostat. Note: 2024 sales estimated.

Data from the SPC suggests that domestic cement sales in Poland peaked at 19.4Mt in 2022. They fell by 12% year-on-year to 16.6Mt in 2023 and then appear to have grown to 17.1Mt in 2024 based on estimated data. It is hard to replicate the SPC’s methodology for determining cement imports into Poland based on Eurostat data. However, data in its Economic Impact Report published at the end of 2024 suggests that imports from Ukraine grew from 79,000t in 2019 to 332,000t in 2023. Any significant rise in imports of cement in 2024, as the local industry recovered from the decline in 2023, seems likely to have caused concern.

Polish concern at growing imports from Ukraine started to be expressed in the press from early 2024 onwards when the 2023 data became apparent. Germany had been the biggest source of imports from the mid-2010s. Yet Germany and Ukraine both supplied about 30% of total imports each in 2023. For example, SPC head Zbigniew Pilch noted in April 2024 that imports from Ukraine were growing steadily each month and represented nearly half of total imports in January 2024. He described these volumes as “deeply concerning.” The Association of Cement Producers in Ukraine (Ukrcement) later attempted to soothe Polish concerns in late 2024 looking at longer import trends and bringing up the challenges facing Ukraine-based producers operating in a warzone.

Concerns about imports from Ukraine in eastern countries in the EU go back decades but have been clouded by the war with Russia. This is now reasserting itself as import levels grow, the cost of decarbonising heavy industry becomes more urgent and the CBAM comes into force. That said , cement plants in Ukraine look unlikely to cope with the CBAM that well due to their relatively high emissions intensity. Yet, other exporting countries outside the EU with lower cement sector emissions intensities may simply displace their competitors. Hence, the SPC’s call for a quota. The kinds of arguments that the SPC is making about carbon leakage are likely to grow fiercer across the EU as the definitive stage of the CBAM, due to start in 2026, draws nearer. Will the current situation lead to ‘the end of cement production in the EU?’ Time will tell…

Najmat Al Samawa Cement (NAS Cement) in Iraq announced this week that its second production line was successfully fired up on 13 May 2025. The new 5500t/day line was formally announced in May 2023. It joins the existing line at the site and should bring the plant’s total production capacity to around 3Mt/yr. The plant is a joint-venture between Pakistan-based Lucky Cement Limited and the Al Shumookh Company in Dubai and its representatives in Iraq.

Global Cement Magazine interviewed Intezar Ahmad, the Director of Operations at NAS Cement, in the November 2024 issue. He explained that China-based TCDRI was the main contractor for both the original and new lines. Equipment for Line 2 was also supplied by Fives Pillard, Loesche and IKN. Commissioning was scheduled for the second quarter of 2025. This, nicely, appears to be spot on. Lucky Cement added in its statement about the new line this week that it is also building a new 0.65Mt/yr cement grinding mill at the plant. This addition is expected to be commissioned during the second half of the 2025 calendar year. Lucky Cement also operates a cement grinding plant, under a joint-venture, in Basra.

The expansion at NAS Cement is by no means the only one as there have been a number of project announcements over the last three months. Germany-based Gebr. Pfeiffer revealed in late-March 2025 that it had won an order to supply a vertical roller mill for the Al Amir cement plant in Najaf. This contract was awarded through the China-based contractor Sinoma Suzhou. Commissioning is planned for the second half of 2026. Then, one month later in April 2025, Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani made a statement launching ‘implementation works’ at four cement plants in Al-Muthanna Province. This included the 6000t/day Al-Arabi Cement Plant, the 6000t/day Al-Khairat Al-Muthanna Cement Plant, the 6600t/day Al-Samawa Cement Plant and the 6000t/day Al-Etihad Cement Plant. Al-Sudani also mentioned the start of commercial operations at NAS Cement’s second line. Subsequently, IVI Holding signed a US$240m deal with Sinoma Overseas in mid-May 2025 to build a 6000t/day plant in Al-Muthanna Province. Presumably, this is one of the projects that the government highlighted. Finally, the Kurdistan Region prime minister Masrour Barzani inaugurated the 6300t/day Dabin cement plant at around the same time. This last project was built by PowerChina together with a power station.

The Iraqi economy has been doing well in recent years. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) reported in May 2025 that the non-oil sector experienced “very strong growth” of 13.8% in 2023. This slowed down to 2.5% in 2024 due to a slowdown in public investment and in the services sector, and a weaker trade balance. However, the IMF noted that the agriculture, manufacturing, and construction sectors had remained resilient. Non-oil sector growth is forecast to remain subdued in 2025 amid a “...challenging global environment and financing constraints.” In its coverage of the new line at NAS Cement, Pakistan Today reported that the country has a notional cement production capacity of around 40Mt/yr but that many of the older plants have suffered from under-investment. Accordingly, the domestic market is around 25Mt/yr supported by state-funded housing projects, oil-field infrastructure schemes and reconstruction in Mosul. 3 - 4Mt of this is supplied via imports from Iran and Türkiye. The newspaper also noted the risk that all these new cement plant projects may face from variable gas supplies from the government. NAS Cement, for example, switched from heavy fuel oil (HFO) to gas in 2022.

Cement sector capacity expansion is coming in Iraq following a revived local economy. Risks abound though due to the country’s economic outlook, its dependence on oil and an geopolitical uncertainty. Yet money is being spent and new projects are starting to be commissioned. Onwards!

Demand for heavy building materials in the UK dropped in the first quarter of 2025, with ready-mix concrete sales reaching a new 60-year low.¹ In an update last week, the UK’s Mineral Products Association (MPA) attributed the decline to existing economic headwinds, compounded by global trade disruptions, reduced investor confidence and renewed inflationary pressures.

Major infrastructure projects – including the HS2 high-speed railway in the English Midlands, the Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant in Somerset and the Sizewell C nuclear power plant in Suffolk – failed to offset delays and cancellations by cash-strapped local councils to roadwork projects. Residential construction, meanwhile, is ‘slowly but steadily’ recovering from historical lows, amid continuing high mortgage rates since late 2024.

The most interesting part of the MPA’s market appraisal was its warning of ‘new risks emerging in the global economy.’ These concern the new tariffs raised by the US against its import partners. The possible consequences, the MPA says, imperil the UK’s supply chains, construction sector and growth.

Of particular immediacy is the threat of imports into the UK from countries that previously focussed on the US market. The MPA said that the industry ‘cannot compete’ against increased low-cost, CO₂-intensive imports. It named Türkiye, which sends around 6.9Mt/yr of cement and clinker to the US, as a key threat. Türkiye became subject to the blanket 10% ‘baseline’ tariff on 2 April 2025.

The MPA probably didn’t have a particular company in mind when it said this. However, it bears noting that Turkish interests gained a share of UK cement capacity in October 2024, when Çimsa acquired 95% of Northern Ireland-based Mannok. Besides the Derrylin cement plant (situated on the border between Fermanagh, UK, and Cavan, Ireland), Mannok operates the Rochester cement storage and distribution facility in Kent, 50km from London. The facility currently supplies cement from Derrylin to Southern England and the Midlands. It could easily serve as a base of operations for processing and distributing imported cement and clinker from further afield.

Meanwhile in South West England, Portugal-based Cimpor is building a €20 – 25m cement import terminal in the Port of Bristol. The company is subject to 20% tariffs on shipments to the US from its home country. Its parent company, Taiwan Cement Corporation, is subject to 32% US tariffs from Taiwan.

But the plot thickens… On 8 May 2025, the UK became the first country to conclude a trade agreement with the US after the erection of the new tariff regime, under which the US$73bn/yr-worth of British goods sold in the US became subject to a 10% tariff.² The latest agreement brought partial relief for an allied sector of UK cement: steel. 180,000t flowed into the US from the UK in 2024.³ In 2024, the UK exported 7120t of cement and clinker to the US, up by a factor of 10 decade-on-decade from just 714t in 2014, all of it into two US customs districts, Philadelphia and New York City.⁴

In what may be one of the first true ‘Brexit benefits,’ UK cement exporters now ‘enjoy’ a US tariff rate half that of their EU competitors, notably those in Greece. Like the UK’s more modest volumes, Greece’s 1.82Mt/yr-worth of cement and clinker exports stateside also enter via the US’ eastern seaports, at New York City, Tampa and Norfolk. Given the overlaps in ownership between the Greek and UK cement sectors, it is conceivable that optimisation of cement export flows across Europe may already be under discussion.

On 6 May 2025, the UK and Indian governments announced a trade deal that will lift customs duties on almost all current Indian exports to the UK. UK MPs are still seeking clarifications as to whether this will include industrial products that might be dumped.⁵ Theoretically, the threat from an oversupplied and fast-growing cement industry like India’s could be existential to the UK cement industry.

As the UK invests heavily in its future, including with the HyNet Consortium, imports pose a major threat. Given enough time, the UK could develop a leading position in the decarbonisation space. Will it have enough time? Existential threats certainly add a sense of jeopardy.

References
1. Mineral Products Association, ‘Weak start to 2025 for building materials sales amid growing economic headwinds,’ 6 May 2025, www.mineralproducts.org/News/2025/release16.aspx

2. HM Government, ‘UK overseas trade in goods statistics November 2024,’ 16 January 2025, www.gov.uk/government/statistics/uk-overseas-trade-in-goods-statistics-november-2024/uk-overseas-trade-in-goods-statistics-november-2024-commentary

3. UK Steel, ‘US 25% tariffs on UK steel imports come into effect,’ 12 March 2025, www.uksteel.org/steel-news-2025/us-25-tariffs-on-uk-steel-imports-come-into-effect

4. United States Geological Survey, ‘Cement in December 2024,’ January 2025, https://d9-wret.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/assets/palladium/production/s3fs-public/media/files/mis-202412-cemen.pdf

5. Welsh Liberal Democrats, ‘UK-Indian Trade Deal: Government Refuses to Answer Whether it Has Conceded on Cheap Indian Steel Imports,’ 6 May 2025, www.libdems.wales/news/article/uk-indian-trade-deal-government-refuses-to-answer-whether-it-has-conceded-on-cheap-indian-steel-imports

Stop press! The Portland Cement Association (PCA) has renamed itself as the American Cement Association (ACA).

Speaking to the audience at the IEEE-IAS/PCA Cement Industry Cement Conference taking place this week in Birmingham, Alabama, ACA president Mike Ireland said that the new name better represents its members, from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific coast. He added that the old name, the PCA, had caused the association confusion over the years with it being mistaken as only representing Portland, Oregon, or Portland, Maine.

This follows comments from Ireland to Global Cement Magazine in April 2024. At that time he also mentioned how changing levels of production of ordinary Portland cement (OPC) compared to blended cements had suggested a rethink. Surveys were then sent out by the PCA asking people what they thought about in connection to the association and which name suggestions they liked. A year or so later and the new name has arrived. Thankfully the PCA didn’t determine the name by public ballot alone, thereby avoiding the risk of a joke name. Readers wondering about this can remind themselves about the time the UK Natural Environment Research Council ran a website survey asking what a new polar research ship should be called. The vessel was eventually called the RRS Sir David Attenborough rather than the internet’s choice of Boaty McBoatface!

Global Cement Weekly also reflected upon the point Ireland made about the change in the blends of cement being used. The adoption of Portland Limestone Cement (PLC) production in the US contributed to the rise in blended cements shipments. United States Geological Survey (USGS) data shows that shipments of blended cements more than doubled from 26Mt in 2022 to 61Mt in 2024. This compares to shipments of OPC of 41Mt in 2024. This change appears to have been mostly accepted so far, but it is not without its detractors. For example, take this campaign promoting a return to traditional Type I and II cements on ‘performance’ grounds.

As for the US cement market, USGS data shows that shipments of Portland and blended cement fell by about 13% year-on-year to 11.8Mt in the first two months of 2025 from 13.8Mt in the same period in 2024. This was for both domestic shipments and imports. Most of the cement companies that have so far released first quarter financial results for 2025 reported poor weather adversely affecting sales. Holcim noted that sales improved in March 2025. Cemex blamed its lower sales volumes of cement and ready-mixed concrete on the period having one less working day compared to 2024. CRH pointed out in its analysts’ presentation that the first quarter of the year is typically the smallest of the four in terms of sales volumes. The really interesting data may start to emerge in the second and subsequent quarters, as the markets and supply chains start to react to current US trade policy. At the time of writing, widespread tariffs on many countries were announced at the start of April 2025 but then subsequently paused for 90 days.

The American Cement Association has a new name for the 21st Century. The PCA has served it well as a name for over 100 years, but now seems a good time for a change. Whether the future is one of blended cements, carbon capture, a return to OPC or whatever else remains to be seen. Yet the future of construction in the US looks set to involve plenty of cement. There are sure to be challenges along the way. Here’s to the next 100 years.

Anhui Conch Cement held an event in Wuhu, China, this week showcasing its new artificial intelligence (AI) model for the cement sector. The cement company and Huawei started the project in April 2024 with the support of the China Building Materials Federation. The companies say they have now identified over 200 “promising AI application scenarios across 15 categories” across the entire production process from quarrying to packaging and logistics. Conch has set up an AI training centre using the Huawei Cloud Stack product. It is using Huawei’s Pangu prediction, computer vision (CV) and natural language processing (NLP) models to create an AI operating system that integrates central training, edge inference, cloud-edge synergy, continuous learning and ongoing optimisation.

Thankfully Huawei gave some examples of what this actually meant for operators in the real world. The model is able to give real-time recommendations of key quality features enabling the prediction of three-day and 28-day clinker strength. The predicted strength values closely match test results, with deviations within 1MPa and an accuracy rate exceeding 85%. Other benefits include reducing kiln fuel consumption by 1%, monitoring and managing various components and machines along the production line, staff safety gains and creating a ‘smart digital assistant’ that can answer technical questions from employees.

Little of this seems particularly novel, so far, compared to what other companies are already doing in this field. For example, ABB said in early 2022 that it was using machine learning to predict 28-day strength on the day of sampling and in 2023 that it was doing it using production data provided every two - three hours. Another example is the work that Inform does using AI-based software to support logistics for heavy building materials. Plenty of other western-based companies also offer production optimisation and/or predictive maintenance products.

Conch’s use of an NLP model to create a knowledge base assistant does seem new for the cement sector. Although how specific the software running it might be to one business or industrial area remains to be seen. One could easily imagine this kind of product being sold to lots of different kinds of industries in the manner of current enterprise style software. Along these lines though, Juan Beltrán, digital manager of global sales excellence at Holcim, told McKinsey in an interview about Holcim’s pilot project in Spain testing an AI-enabled copilot customer-ordering assistant via WhatsApp.

Recent events in AI for the cement sector include ABB’s agreement to work with UK-based Carbon Re in late 2024. This collaboration was intended to combine ABB's expertise in automation and process control with Carbon Re's AI and machine learning technologies. It followed a pilot at a cement plant in the Czech Republic. On the producer side, Holcim said in mid-2024 that it was preparing to expand the use of AI-based software to 100 production plants by 2028. It noted that it had installed the system at 45 plants so far at the time of this announcement and that it was using a predictive maintenance solution from software supplier C3 AI. Titan Cement said that it had invested in Spain-based AI software supplier Optimitive in February 2025. Then, Cemex announced this week that it too had invested in Optimitive, via its corporate venture capital arm Cemex Ventures. Molins has also worked with Optimitive.

What isn't being disclosed much are the examples of the mistakes of introducing AI into cement production. These are valuable learning opportunities for any company implementing this kind of software. However, the developers and cement producers are extremely unlikely to admit anything publicly. Global Cement Weekly has heard off-the-record information previously about AI projects at cement plants that have gone wrong but we can’t reveal it either. To his credit though Beltrán mentions an incident, in his interview with McKinsey, where the WhatsApp ordering assistant was tricked during testing into almost placing an order for a truck of gazpacho soup!

We’re still watching how AI is being deployed in heavy industries such as cement. The announcement by Conch is exactly the kind of thing its peers are doing around the world. So far what they’ve done is impressive but not unique. Yet, China’s large but shrinking cement sector and its determination to develop its own AI-based software sector may start to deliver more cutting-edge advances in the future. Companies elsewhere are also pressing ahead to find out how AI products will deliver efficiency gains.