Displaying items by tag: Award

Panama: Cemex's Panamanian operations have been awarded the highest recognition in sustainable development and environmental management by the Panamanian Chamber of Construction (CAPAC). Cemex Panama earned this honour for its implementation of protection and conservation policies in the environments where it operates.

The award criteria included the company's environmental policies, energy and water efficiency, waste management and the handling of chemical substances; air pollution mitigation; environmental controls and records; environmental contingency plans; and reforestation plans.

Cemex Panama obtained this recognition thanks to such initiatives as its Technological Innovation Project based on P+L Systems, which resulted in energy savings of 32% at its cement plant; its Reduction of Water Consumption Project, which helped reduce its water consumption by over 35%; its waste management and waste-water treatment policies; its Reforestation Project, which will enable the recovery of 633,000m2 of forest by 2019.

"We are very honoured to receive this award, which recognises the integration of environmental management in our daily operations and processes," said Andres Jimenez, President of Cemex Panama. "Sustainability is an integral part of our business model and a core component of Cemex's future growth."

Nicaragua: For the seventh year in a row Cemex has been awarded a national prize as a 'leading business' for its industrial safety and hygiene management procedures by Nicaragua's National Council for Work Safety and Hygiene at the Ministry of Labour.

This continued recognition is linked to its programmes that encourage workers to report poor behaviour or unsuitable conditions that could otherwise lead to accidents. Cemex Nicaragua is on the verge of reaching zero incidents through more than 14,000hr of training per year.

Nicaragua: Cemex Nicaragua, has been awarded a national prize as a leading business for its industrial safety management procedures. The award was given by the National Council for Work Safety and Hygiene and refers to the firm's Canal plant in southwest Managua. The firm is building a new production unit in the northeast section of the same city at the moment. This new unit is due to begin operations early in 2015.

US: Cemex USA is pleased to announce that six of its cement plants have earned the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Energy Star certification. The recognition of Cemex USA's plants in Brooksville (Florida), Miami (Florida), Clinchfield (Georgia), Fairborn (Ohio), Louisville (Kentucky) and Victorville (California), demonstrates that these plants perform among the top 25% of similar US plants for energy conservation.

2014 marks the eighth consecutive year of certification for the Clinchfield plant, an achievement realised by only one other cement plant in the US. It is also the fourth consecutive certification for the Miami plant, the third for Brooksville, Victorville and Fairborn plants and the sixth year for the Louisville plant.

Throughout the year, all of the recognised plants put into practice the energy-efficiency principles established by the Energy Star guidelines for energy management that were developed by the EPA. These plants implemented energy conservation and monitoring technologies, promoted energy-efficiency awareness among employees and completed energy-reduction projects.

"Cemex is committed to sustainable practices throughout our operations, including energy-efficiency," said Karl Watson Jr., president of Cemex USA. "We are honoured to again be recognised by the EPA and Energy Star for our commitment to sustainable practices."

Germany: Loesche ThermoProzess GmbH has been certified as a specialised welding company. Certification according to DIN 18800-7: 2008-11, Class D in relation to welding steel constructions was performed by the SLV Duisburg (welding technology training and testing institute) of the GSI (company for international welding technology).

The certificate covers 135 metal-active gas-welding processes with solid wire electrodes (partially mechanised) and 141 tungsten inert gas welding processes (manual) for complete machine and plant construction (serial numbers according to DIN EN ISO 4063). It concerns the base materials S235, S275 and S355 in line with DIN EN 100025 as well as stainless steels from the strength class 235 in line with the relevant approval document from the DIBt (German Institute for Civil Engineering).

"In future, Loesche ThermoProzess GmbH will be even more qualified to provide customers with first-class products, on the next day if necessary, which ensure the smooth operation of production facilities," said Dietmar Leiter, the responsible welding engineer at Loesche ThermoProzess GmbH.

Germany: Loesche GmbH has won the Deutscher Bildungspreis 2014 in the category 'Production: small and medium-sized enterprises,' for its training and management programmes. It beat 120 other companies to the award, which was awarded at a ceremonial event at the historic Munich Künstlerhaus on 12 May 2014.

The Deutscher Bildungspreis is presented annually by TÜV Süd Academy and EuPD Research Sustainable Management under the motto 'Learning from the best.' In four sector categories, companies are awarded for best education and talent management under the auspices of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

"Loesche owes this success to the instruments of the demand-oriented personnel development introduced in 2008 as well as the close cooperation with the Loesche Training Center and the benefits for the staff associated with this," said Christian Trzeczak from Loesche's Corporate Human Resources department. "This result will further consolidate the employer brand Loesche and shows that we are on the right track towards a productive personnel development in the company."

Canada: Community leaders and St Marys Cement Inc. executives were on hand on 29 May 2014 to celebrate the company's Bowmanville plant receiving the Gold Award Certification in Energy Excellence. Certification in Energy Excellence is a programme that tests an organisation's energy management processes. Over 160 energy management criteria, based on world-class best practices, are assessed. The programme is independently moderated and validated by the UK's National Energy Foundation.

The Bowmanville plant was recognised for its energy conservation performance and its success at energy management. To date, the plant's approach to energy management has saved US$10m. In 2014 it is on target to again reduce its energy bill by US$1m. These savings are achieved though an integrated and balanced approach of smart energy buying, matching energy-intensive plant operations with off-peak rates, common sense energy conservation practices and other plant-based energy initiatives.

John Pooley, Chief Assessor for the Certification in Energy Excellence, presented the plant with the award. "The Bowmanville facility is one of the largest cement plants in North America with a rated capacity of over 1.8Mt/yr," said Pooley. "Cement plants consume significant amounts of energy, but few other industrial operations in the world have come close to achieving the same level of integration in energy savings."

Marty Fallon, CEO of St Marys Cement, Celso Martini, VP Cement Operations, and Fabio Garcia, Manager of Plant Operations, accepted the award on behalf of St Marys. "St Marys is extremely proud of the effort, ingenuity and technical expertise deployed by the men and women working here to achieve the direct savings and establish systems to keep our energy purchase prices as low as possible," said Fallon. "The energy reductions at this plant are getting more and more attention as a benchmark in sustainability criteria for the entire sector. In fact, in 2015 the plant will be the featured site visit during the 2015 IEEE-IAS/PCA Cement Industry Technical Conference."

The Bowmanville plant manager Fabio Garcia said, "I want to especially commend the energy management and conservation committee, which we call E=MC2. With representatives from finance, human resources, environment, quality control, maintenance, mining and production departments, the committee identified and acted upon over 100 separate energy efficiency initiatives. The magic of the E=MC2 approach was many of the energy savings required little capital expenditure or were done at no cost."

Since the E=MC2 committee's inception, the plant has reduced its energy usage by a total of 171,429MW and has lowered CO2 emissions by 31,886t.

Pakistan: Lucky Cement has won the Green Supply Chain Award at the 3rd International Shipping, Logistics and Supply Chain conference held in Karachi. The conference was organised by the Publicity Channel with the support of United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to acknowledge companies that are making sustainability a core part of their supply chain strategy.

The Pakistan-based cement producer has initiated a number of sustainability projects such as alternative fuel, energy conservation and plantation drives. In addition, the company's captive power plants have been upgraded to improve environmental efficiency.

"As an industry leader we have a huge responsibility to foster a culture of environmental sustainability throughout the manufacturing sector. We take pride in stating that we have done this job above par, owing to our innovative strategies in acquiring green technology across all our operations," said Lucky Cement Chief Operating Officer Noman Hasan.

United Arab Emirates: Turkish cement producer Adana Cement has won an award for safety performance improvement at the 11th Annual DuPont Safety and Sustainability Awards, which took place in Dubai on 24 September 2013. Six award recipients were selected by an independent jury comprised of leading experts in occupational safety and sustainability.

Adana Cement was chosen for its efforts to create a safe work environment. In 2005 the company established an integrated OHSAS 18001-certified Safety Management System, before implementing further processes and improvements in 2008 after recognition that 96% of accidents were caused by dangerous behaviour, rather than conditions.

Together, these initiatives have had a profound effect in shaping a positive safety culture among employees. In particular, a multi-faceted approach, including behaviour-oriented site visits, accident information meetings, reward and sanction practices and a schedule of continuous training programmes, has resulted in a dramatic decrease in employee and sub-contractor accidents since 2008, based on statistics collected since 2003. A new record of 243 uninterrupted days without an accident was achieved in 2012, in a period when expanding production objectives were successfully met.