Displaying items by tag: Alternative raw materials

Malaysia: Cahya Mata Cement will build a second line at its Mambong facility in Kuching to increase cement production and support Sarawak's infrastructure development. Construction is expected to take 24 months, with expected completion in March 2027.

The project will add 6000t/day of clinker capacity, raising output to 1.92Mt/yr. This will enable the company to become self-sufficient in its clinker supply and therefore eliminate the need for imports.

The company signed a technical consulting agreement with Sinoma Industry Engineering in November 2023 to design and construct the new production line. It will feature a waste heat recovery system, generating up to 6MW of power, alongside a dust filter designed to cut emissions to half of the current regulatory limit, according to the New Straits Times. The new line will also use locally-sourced alternative raw materials to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels.

Cahya Mata Cement acting division head Choong Ju Tang said "Once the project is approved and construction is completed, Cahya Mata Cement will be well-positioned to meet the construction industry's demand.”

Taiwan: Taiwan Cement Corporation (TCC) and 100 construction firms have together launched the Low Carbon Construction Pioneer Alliance. CNA News has reported that the founding members eliminated 146,000t of CO₂ emissions altogether through their use of reduced-CO₂ building materials since November 2024. This includes despatches of 800,000m³ of Portland limestone cement (PLC) concrete by TCC, with 2.5Mm³ in cumulative orders to date. TCC first launched its PLC in October 2023, touting an emissions reduction of 15% compared to ordinary Portland cement (OPC). It since enlarged the net reduction to 24% through production modifications.

Taiwan Cement chair Zhang Anping said "TCC took the initiative to align with the Global Cement and Concrete Association and released the lowest-carbon PLC concrete in Taiwan. The CO₂ reduction is far greater than the 53% as defined by the government.”

One unusual thing about coverage of cement in the media is the way that discussions often centre precisely on its absence – that is, on alternatives to cement. These alternatives boast unique chemistries and performance characteristics, but are all produced without Portland cement clinker. They are generally called ‘alternative cements,’ perhaps because ‘cement-free cement’ does not have such a commercially viable ring to it. This contradictory tendency reached a new high in the past week, with developments in alternative cement across Asia, Europe, the Middle East and North America. Together, they hint at a more diverse future for the ‘cement’ industry than the one we know today.

Asia

In Indonesia, Suvo Strategic Minerals has concluded tests with Makassar State University of a novel nickel-slag-based cement. Huadi Nickel-Alloy Indonesia supplied raw materials, and tests showed a seven-day compressive strength of 37.5MPa. Suvo Strategic Minerals says that a partnership with Huadi Nickel-Alloy Indonesia for commercial production is a likely next step.

Europe

Cement producer Mannok and minerals company Boliden partnered with the South Eastern Applied Materials (SEAM) research centre in Ireland to launch a project to develop supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) from shale on 7 October 2024. The project will additionally investigate CO₂-curing of cement paste backfill for use in mines. Irish state-owned global commerce agency Enterprise Ireland has contributed €700,000 in funding.

UK-based SCM developer Karbonite expects to launch trial production of its olivine-based SCM with a concrete company in 2025. The start-up launched Karbonite Group Holding BV, with offices in the Netherlands, to facilitate this new phase. Karbonite’s SCM is activated at 750 – 850°C and sequesters CO₂ in the activation process, resulting in over 56% lower CO₂ emissions than ordinary Portland cement (OPC). Managing director Rajeev Sood told Global Cement that talks are already underway for subsequent expansions into the UAE and India.

Back in the UK, contractor John Sisk & Son has received €597,000 from national innovation agency Innovate UK. John Sisk & Son is testing fellow Ireland-based company Ecocem’s <25% clinker cement technology in concrete for use in its on-going construction of the Wembley Park mixed development in London.

At the same time, Innovate UK granted a further €3.23m to other companies for concrete decarbonisation. Recipients included a calcined clay being developed by Cemcor, an SCM being developed from electric arc furnace byproducts by Cocoon, a geopolymer cement technology being developed by EFC Green Concrete Technology UK and an initiative to develop alternative cement from recycled concrete fines at the Materials Processing Institute in Middlesbrough. Also included was the Skanska Costain Strabag joint venture, which is working on the London stretch of the upcoming HS2 railway. The joint venture, along with partners including cement producer Tarmac and construction chemicals company Sika UK, will test low-kaolinite London clay as a raw material with which to produce calcined clay as a cement substitute in concrete structures in HS2’s rail tunnels.

Middle East

Talks are underway between UK-based calcined clay producer Next Generation SCM and City Cement subsidiary Nizak Mining Company over the possible launch of a joint venture in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The joint venture would build a 350,000t/yr reduced-CO₂ concrete plant, which would use alternative cement based on Next Generation SCM’s calcined clay.

North America

Texas-based SCM developer Solidia Technologies recently patented its carbonatable calcium silicate-based alternative cement, which sequesters CO₂ as it cures.

Meanwhile, C-Crete Technologies made its first commercial pour of its granite-based cement-free concrete in New York, US. C-Crete Technologies says that the product offers cost and performance parity with conventional cement, with net zero CO₂ emissions. Its raw material is globally more abundant than the limestone used as a raw material for clinker. Other abundantly available feedstocks successfully deployed within C-Crete Technologies’ repertoire include basalt and zeolite.

Across New York State, in Binghamton, KLAW Industries has succeeded in replacing 20% of concrete’s cement content with its powdered glass-based SCM, Pantheon. KLAW Industries has delivered samples to local municipalities and the New York State Department of Transportation. Its success expands the discussion of possible circular cement ingredients from the industrial sphere into post-consumer resources.

In Calgary, Canada, a novel SCM has drawn attention from one of the major cement incumbents: Germany-based Heidelberg Materials. It invested in local construction and demolition materials (CDM)-based SCM developer EnviCore on 9 October 2024. The companies plan to build a pilot plant at an existing Heidelberg Materials CDM recycling centre.

Conclusion

Alternative cement developers are still finding the words to talk about their products. They may be more than ‘supplementary’ up to the point of entirely supplanting 100% of clinker. Product webpages offer ‘hydraulic binder,’ ‘pozzolan’ and even ‘cement.’ As alternative ‘cements’ are developed, they build on the work of pioneers like Joseph Aspdin and Louis Vicat. Start-ups and their backers are now reaching commercial offerings, on a similar-but-different footing to cement itself. None of these novel materials positions itself as the sole, last-minute ‘super sub’ in the construction sector’s confrontation with climate change. Rather, they are a package of solutions which can combine into a net zero-emissions heavy building materials offering, hopefully before 2050.

Related to this is the need for ‘technology neutral’ standards, as championed this week by the Alliance for Low-Carbon Cement and Concrete (ALCCC), along with 23 other European industry associations, civil society organisations and think tanks. The term may sound new, but the concept is critical to the eventual uptake of alternative cements: standards, the ALCCC says, should be purely performance-based. They ought not attempt to define what technology, for example cement clinker, makes a suitable building material. According to the ALCCC, Europe’s building materials standards are not technology neutral, but instead ‘gatekeep’ market access, to the benefit of conventional cement and the exclusion of ‘proven and scalable low-carbon products.’

At the same time, cement itself is changing. Market research from USD Analytics showed an anticipated 5% composite annual growth rate in blended cement sales between 2024 and 2032, more than doubling throughout the period from US$253bn to US$369bn. If you can’t beat it, blend with it!

For a further discussion of alternative cement and binders in Europe, see Global Cement’s interview with ALCCC co-ordinator Joren Verschaeve in the forthcoming November issue of Global Cement Magazine on 17 October 2024.

US: C-Crete Technologies has poured its granite-based cement-free concrete in its first construction application at the upcoming JPMorgan Chase headquarters at 270 Park Avenue, Manhattan. Ecology, Environment and Conservation News has reported that the concrete generates no net CO₂ emissions by sequestering atmospheric CO₂ in its curing process. The concrete conforms to ASTM International standards, with a compressive strength exceeding 5000psi. Other partners on the project included engineering firm Severud Associates Consulting Engineers and construction management firm AECOM Tishman.

C-Crete Technologies president Rouzbeh Savary said "We are thrilled to introduce our new granite-based concrete at such a prestigious and iconic location. The building at 270 Park Avenue is set to become a landmark not only for its architectural grandeur, but also for its sustainable construction practices."

Severud Associates Consulting Engineers senior associate Fortunato Orlando said "The performance of C-Crete for concrete on metal deck, topping slabs, pavements and landscape work, coupled with its eco-friendly attributes, makes it a revolutionary product for the future of the construction industry."

AECOM Tishman chief operating officer John Kovacs said "Just a few years ago, constructing devoid of Portland cement and CO₂ emissions would have seemed unimaginable. And yet today, we stand as the world's first, setting new thresholds of what's possible in sustainable construction. We thank all of our partners on this project and look forward to the day when CO₂ emission-free construction is not simply an idea or a new innovation, but the industry standard across every build."

The mountainous eastern shore of the Adriatic Sea and its hinterlands in Europe’s Balkan Peninsula have one of the world’s highest densities of countries: six, across a broad equilateral triangle of 212,000km². All six states – Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia – are historically characterised by political non-alignment, carrying over from the Cold War period, and all the more notable for the presence of the EU to the north (Croatia, Hungary and Romania) and east (Bulgaria and Greece).

A nine-plant, 9Mt/yr local cement sector serves the 16.8m-strong population of the unconsolidated ‘bloc.’ Albania has 2.8Mt/yr (31%), Serbia 2.7Mt/yr (30%), Bosnia & Herzegovina 1.6Mt/yr (18%), North Macedonia 1.4Mt/yr (15%) and Kosovo 500,000t/yr (6%), while Montenegro has no cement capacity – for now. Altogether, this gives this quarter of South East Europe a capacity per capita of 539kg/yr. The industry consists entirely of companies based outside of the region. Albania’s two plants are Lebanese and Greek-owned (by Seament Holding and Titan Cement Group respectively). Titan Cement Group also controls single-plant Kosovo and North Macedonia, and competes in the Serbian cement industry alongside larger and smaller plants belonging to Switzerland-based Holcim and Ireland-based CRH, respectively. Lastly, Bosnia & Herzegovina’s capacity is shared evenly between Germany-based Heidelberg Materials and Hungary-based Talentis International Construction, with one plant each.

Lafarge Srbija, Holcim's subsidiary in Serbia, announced plans for its second plant in the country, at Ratari in Belgrade, last week. No capacity has yet emerged, but the plant will cost €110m, making something in the region of the country’s existing 0.6 – 1.2Mt/yr plants seem likely. This would give Serbia over a third of total capacity in the Central Balkans and twice the number of plants of any other country there, expanding its per-capita capacity by 22 – 44%, from a regionally low 408kg/yr to 500 – 590kg/yr.

In announcing the upcoming Ratari cement plant, Lafarge Srbija laid emphasis on its sustainability. The plant will use 1Mt/yr of ash from the adjacent Nikola Tesla B thermal power plant as a raw material in its cement production. In this way, it will help to clear the Nikola Tesla B plant’s 1600 hectare ash dumps, from which only 180,000t of ash was harvested in 2023. Circularity has been front and centre of Holcim’s discussions of its growth in Serbia for some time. When Lafarge Srbija acquired aggregates producer Teko Mining Serbia in 2022, the group indicated that the business would play a part in its development of construction and demolition materials (CDM)-based cement and concrete.

Holcim’s Strategy 2025 growth plan entails bolt-on acquisitions in ‘mature markets,’ backed by strategic divestments elsewhere. Other companies have been more explicit about a realignment towards metropolitan markets, above all in North America, at a time when they are also diversifying away from cement and into other materials. Just why a leading producer should look to build cement capacity in Serbia warrants investigation.

Serbia is the only Central Balkan member of Cembureau, the European cement association. In a European market report for 2022, the association attributed to it the continent’s fastest declining cement consumption (jointly with Slovakia), down by 11% year-on-year. Like the rest of Europe, Serbia is also gradually shrinking, its population dwindling by 0.7% year-on-year to 6.62m in 2023, which limits hopes for a longer-term recovery. Serbia remains the largest country in the Central Balkans, with 39% of the total regional population.

Several factors have compounded Serbia’s difficulties as a cement-producing country. Firstly, like the Nikola Tesla B thermal power plant, its kilns run on coal. 50% of this coal originated in Russia and Ukraine in 2021, causing the entire operation to become ‘imperilled’ after the former’s brutal invasion of the latter in February 2022, according to the Serbian Cement Industry Association. In planning terms, this was a case of putting half one’s eggs in two baskets – and dropping them both.

Secondly, Serbia’s choice of export markets is mainly confined to either the EU or global markets via the River Danube, Black Sea and Mediterranean. Either way, it is in competition with a cement exporting giant: Türkiye. Serbia sold €19.7m-worth of cement in the EU in 2023, up by 63% over the three-year period since 2020 – 31% behind Türkiye’s €28.8m (more than double its 2020 figure).¹ One other Central Balkan country had a greater reliance on the EU market: Bosnia & Herzegovina. It exported €48.4m-worth of cement there, quadruple its 2020 figure and behind only China (€133m) and the UK (€54.7) in cement exports to the bloc by value.

Bosnia & Herzegovina’s cement industry underwent a different permutation at the start of 2024: an acquisition, replacing one EU-based player with another. Lukavac Cement, which operates the 800,000t/yr Lukavac cement plant in Tuzla, changed hands from Austria-based building materials producer Asamer Baustoffe to Hungary-based property developer Talentis International Construction. Talentis International Construction belongs to one of Hungary’s major family-owned conglomerates, Mészáros Csoport.

Besides Central Europe, Balkan countries have found a ready source of investments in the past decade in China. In construction alone, Chinese investments total €13.2bn in Serbia, €2.4bn in Bosnia & Herzegovina, €915m in Montenegro and €650m in North Macedonia.² This can be a booster shot to all-important domestic cement markets, but has some risks. Montenegro previously faced bankruptcy after Export-Import Bank of China began to call in an €847m loan for construction of the still upcoming A1 motorway in the country’s Northern Region. This did not put off the Montenegrin government from signing a new memorandum of understanding (MoU) with China-based Shandong Foreign Economic and Technical Cooperation and Shandong Luqiao Group for construction of a new €54m coast road in the Coastal Region in mid-2023.

In Montenegro, UK-based private equity firm Chayton Capital is currently funding a feasibility study for a partly state-owned cement plant and building materials complex at the Pljevlja energy hub in the Northern Region. Along with an upgrade to the existing Pljevlja coal-fired power plant, the project will cost €700m.

In 2026, EU member states will begin to partly tax third-country imports of cement and other products against their specific CO₂ emissions, progressing to the implementation of a 100% Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) by 2034. Montenegro led the Central Balkans’ preparations for the EU’s CBAM roll-out with the introduction of its own emissions trading system in early 2021. Bosnia & Herzegovina will follow its example by 2026, but other countries in the region have struggled to conceive of the arrangement except as part of future EU accession agreements.

Based on the average specific CO₂ emissions of cement produced in the EU, the World Bank has forecast that exporters to the bloc will be disadvantaged if their own specific emissions exceed 5.52kg CO₂eq/€.³ By contrast, any figure below this ought to offer an increased competitive edge. Albanian cement has average emissions of 4.71kg CO₂eq/€, 15% below ‘biting point’ and 13% below Türkiye’s 5.39CO₂eq/€. Albania’s government consolidated its anticipated gains by quintupling the coal tax for 2024 to €0.15/kg. The figure is based on the International Monetary Fund’s recommended minimum CO₂ emissions tax of €55.80/t, 21% shy of the current EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) credit price of €70.49/t.⁴

The Central Balkans is a region of apparently slow markets and industry growth regardless – to 11 cement plants, following the completion of current and upcoming projects. A recurrent theme of capital expenditure investments and the way investors talk about them may help to explain this: sustainability. Looking at the mix of technologies in the current nine plants, these include wet kilns and fuels lines built for conventional fossil fuels. This is not to presume that any given plant might not be happy with its existing equipment as is. Nonetheless, the overall picture is of a set of veteran plants with scope to benefit from the kind of investments which all four global cement producers active in the region are already carrying out elsewhere in Europe. Such plans may already be in motion. In late 2023, Titan Cement Group’s North Macedonian subsidiary Cementarnica Usje secured shareholder approval to take two new loans of up to €27m combined.

As the latest news from Serbia showed, taking care of existing plants does not preclude also building new ones. The cement industry of the Central Balkans is finding its position in the new reduced-CO₂ global cement trade – one in which old and new work together.

References

1. Trend Economy, ‘European Union – Imports and Exports – Articles of cement,’ 28 January 2024, https://trendeconomy.com/data/h2/EuropeanUnion/6810#

2. American Enterprise Institute, 'China Global Investment Tracker,' 3 February 2024 https://www.aei.org/china-global-investment-tracker/

3. World Bank Group, ‘Relative CBAM Exposure Index,’ 15 June 2023, https://www.worldbank.org/en/data/interactive/2023/06/15/relative-cbam-exposure-index

4. Ember, 'Carbon Price Tracker,' 26 August 2024, https://ember-climate.org/data/data-tools/carbon-price-viewer/

US: Gabriel Carrero has taken on the role of Chief Commercial Officer (COO) at Carbon Limit, developer of the CO₂-sequestering concrete additive CaptureCrete. Carrero previously served as Senior Vice President, Sales & Marketing at fellow additive developer CarbonCure, and has held directorial roles in multiple companies in the cement and concrete chemicals innovation space, including working as COO of Sysdyne Technologies and NITROcrete and as Global Director, Specialty Construction Chemicals at GCP Applied Technologies. Carrero holds a Mechanical Engineering degree from the Centre Technological University (UNITEC) and an MBA from the University of Carabobo, both in Venezuela.

Serbia: Lafarge Serbia is set to build a new cement plant in Ratari near Obrenovac, which will utilise 1Mt/yr of ash from the nearby Nikola Tesla B power plant as a raw material in cement production, reports Balkan Green Energy News. This €110m investment marks Serbia's first cement plant built next to a power plant to harness ash directly from the source and address the country’s problem of ash accumulation in dumps.

CEO of Lafarge Serbia Dimitrije Knjeginjić said "Fly ash cannot be used in the cement or concrete industry, or many other industries, without prior processing. This is exactly what the Ratari plant will be dealing with. We will grind, classify and select 1Mt/yr of ash to produce new construction materials."

Australia: Zeolite, kaolin and metakaolin producer Zeotech has appointed James Marsh as its new CEO, effective from 9 September 2024. Current CEO Scott Burkhart will then transition to chief operating officer. The appointment is intended to support Zeotech’s entry into large-scale production of high reactivity metakaolin for use in cement and concrete.

Marsh is a director of Australian Kaolin. He previously worked as executive director sales and marketing at Andromeda Metals, after holding managerial roles at multiple minerals companies. He has a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry and Physics from the University of the West of England, UK.

Managing Director Peter Zardo said "James' technical experience in the industrial mineral and cement industries, especially metakaolin, will be pivotal in accelerating Zeotech's goal of becoming a significant supplier of premium supplementary cementitious materials. Queensland-based leadership is critical to achieving the Company's objectives as we ramp up work programmes and industry engagement, and James will play an essential hands-on role in executing Zeotech's strategy."

James Marsh said "I'm excited to join Zeotech at a crucial stage of the company's strategy, where I can utilise my experience and connections to make it a significant player in decarbonising the construction industry."

China: Eaton and Langham hotels have collaborated with Green Island Cement to transform 8t of oyster shells into a sustainable cement alternative, sourcing 80% of the required limestone for cement.

Amie Lai Gor, general manager of sustainability at Great Eagle Holdings, parent company of the two hotels, said "We brought together like-minded partners to repurpose oyster shells as a sustainable raw material alternative for cement production. Our goal is to encourage more hotels and restaurants to participate, diverting more discarded oyster shells from landfills through upcycling.”

Raymond Cheung Wai-man, division manager at Green Island Cement, highlighted past challenges of separating the shells from impurities like mud and residual meat, which initially deterred the project.

Lai Gor added that future plans include working with local universities to assess the carbon reduction potential of substituting limestone with oyster shells in cement production. Despite the higher costs—tenfold compared to traditional limestone—Cheung believes that scaling up could significantly lower expenses.

Philippines: Holcim Philippines will invest US$6.5m to upgrade its La Union plant and increase the use of alternative fuels and raw materials to 40%. The project will be implemented by Sinoma CBMIPH Construction and will be completed by late 2025, reports the Manila Bulletin.

Nicolas George, Holcim Philippines president and CEO, said the investment aims to reduce CO₂ emissions, promote recycling, support local waste management and provide income for northern Luzon farmers, who will supply biomass residues as alternative fuels.

General manager Zeng Youbing of Sinoma CBMIPH Construction said “This marks the third collaboration between Sinoma CBMIPH and Holcim Philippines since 2021. We are honoured to contribute to Holcim Philippines' decarbonisation and sustainability goals.”