Kenya: Simon Ole Nkeri, the managing director of East African Portland Cement (EAPC), has been questioned by the National Assembly Trade, Industry and Cooperative committee of the Parliament of Kenya. He told the committee that the company has considered the almost US$14m it owes it workers but he was unable to provide a payment schedule, according to the Business Daily newspaper. In August 2018 the Labour Court allowed the Kenya Chemical and Allied Workers Union to recover the money owed to over 400 workers. In late September 2018 the Court of Appeal gave the EAPC 30 days to make a deposit of the owed funds. However, the cement producer resorted to legal means to delay paying the deposit, as it would ‘cripple’ its business operations.

Gabon: Ciments de l’Afrique (CIMAF) Gabon’s sales have grown due to a ‘strong’ demand for cement following a ban of imports since July 2017. Its turnover grew by 37% year-on-year to US$22.8m in first half of 2018 from US$16.7m in the same period in 2017, according to Direct Infos Gabon. Its sales of cement rose by 42% to 0.18Mt from 0.13Mt. Its production also rose by 38% to 0.18Mt from 0.13Mt. Previously, the cement producer said it was planning to start a new production line at its Cimgabon integrated plant by November 2018.

Germany: HeidelbergCement is planning to expand the Atlas quarry of its Paderborn plant. The quarry area will be increased by nine hectares, according to the Neue Westfälische newspaper. The company says that the expansion is necessary to support the supply of raw materials to the plant. It has organised an information forum for local residents.

US: LafargeHolcim has upgraded its terminal at Weirton in West Virginia following a 10-year furlough. The site will be used to store and distribute oil well cement products for markets in the Appalachian region.

“We have made a significant investment in the Weirton terminal in direct response to the growing needs of our energy industry customers. Demand for access to our oil well cement has increased dramatically, yet existing distribution channels had grown congested,” said Jamie M Gentoso, chief executive officer (CEO) of US Cement operations.

The upgrade project included expanding the site, building a new water-based off- loading facility and restoring its silos. During the work LafargeHolcim collaborated with the Army Corps of Engineers, the West Virginia Department of Commerce, the Business Development Corporation of the Northern Panhandle and the local community. In addition, the company worked closely with the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection and Environmental Protection Agency to assure all operating and environmental permits were in place. As part of this collaboration, LafargeHolcim has also been granted additional funding for surrounding site infrastructure improvements and build-out through the conditional grant program known as the West Virginia Industrial Access Road Program (IAR).

US: Elixsys has completed a 100hr continuous pilot test to extract ammonium sulphate and calcium carbonate from flue gas desulphurisation solids at a coal-fired power plant in Pennsylvania. Products made using the company’s proprietary process meet the specifications for fertiliser-quality ammonium sulphate and technical-grade calcium carbonate.

The company intends to start a commercial-scale project of its technology in 2019 once it finds a utility partner. Full-scale operations are planned by 2022. The company is also starting pilot testing on another process to extract metals from coal ash.

Zimbabwe: Edith Matekaire, the commercial director of Lafarge Zimbabwe, has blamed a backlog of foreign currency exchange as the cause of a shortage of cement. The US$2m backlog has caused plant maintenance shutdowns to take longer than they normally would, according to the Herald newspaper. Due to the lack of adequate funding, the shutdowns have been forced to take place during periods of peak production, causing effects in the market.

Despite this, Matekaire said that the local cement sector has more than enough production capacity to meet customers’ needs. Demand is 1.3Mt/yr and cement production is 2.4Mt/yr. Demand is only expected to exceed production from 2020 onwards.

Myanmar: General Saw Johnny, chief of staff of the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), says that the group has not granted permission for Yadanar Sai Kaung Myat Kyaw Company to build a new cement plant at Hnget Pyaw Taw near Hlaingbwe. The representative of the military wing of the Karen National Union, a local political organisation, said that it had met with the company but that no final decision had been made, according to Burma News International. Yadanar Sai Kaung Myat Kyaw Company plans to build a 10,000t/day plant with an investment of US$760m. It intends to pay compensation to the owners of farmlands and plantations that are included in the project area and it has reached an initial agreement with respective state ministry to build the plant.

Turkey: Sanko Holding is planning start a 7MW waste heat recovery (WHR) unit, supplied by Italy’s CTP Team, at its Cimko Narli Cement plant in early 2019. CTP Team signed a turnkey contract for the WHR unit in March 2018. It will be the first unit in Turkey to use Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) technology. The unit will provide approximately 12% of the current plant’s electricity needs, with an annual uptime efficiency of 7920hr and energy of 36kWhr/yr.

“The project will be the first project based on ORC technology with a thermal oil loop in Turkey for heat recovery from the cement industry,” said CTP Team Assistant General Manager Acelya Arik and Sales Director Marco Ernesto Donghi when the contract was signed. They added that since the project is the first ORC-based heat recovery plant in a Turkish cement plant it will be a milestone that will push further WHR projects in this field.

Russia: Eurocement is installing a 24MW captive natural gas power plant at its Kavkazcement plant in Chelyabinsk. The equipment was purchased from Finland’s Wärtsilä for the Euro15.5m project. Construction of the buildings to house the power plant is expected to be completed in November 2018.

The project is a part of an energy efficiency program that Mikhail Skorokhod, the president of Eurocement, signed with Rashid Temrezov, the head of the Karachay-Cherkess Federal Region, as part of the Russian Investment Forum, in 2018.

At present Eurocement has a power generation capacity of 150MW. It has built captive power plants at its Mordovcement, Sengileevskiy, Peterburgcement and Nevyansk cement plants. Upon the completion of the latest program the company is targeting a power capacty of over 400MW.

Russia: HeidelbergCement Russia has held an opening ceremony for a new despatch system at its Slantsev ‘Cesla’ plant in the Leningrad region. Mihail Polendakov, General Director of HeidelbergCement in Russia, Anton Hadjiiski, General Director of the plant, Mikhail Moskvin, Deputy Chairman of the Leningrad Region Government for Construction, and Deputy Prime Minister Leningrad Region - Chairman of the Committee for Economic Development and Investment Activities Dmitry Yalov attended the opening.

Following the upgrade the plant now uses an automated loading system for its trucks. The investment for the project was around Euro13m. The unit has a cement production capacity of 0.8Mt/yr.