Displaying items by tag: Canada

Ireland: Strong sales revenue and earnings growth from CRH’s America Materials and Building Products divisions have driven its performance in the first half of 2022. The group’s total revenue rose by 14% year-on-year to US$15bn in the first half of 2022 from US$13.2bn in the same period in 2021. Its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) grew by 21% to US$2.21bn from US$1.82bn. Its sales revenue of cement, lime and cement products grew by 5% to US$2.47bn.

The group’s America Materials division reported an increase in sales revenue and EBITDA of 17% to US$5.55bn and 12% to US$820m respectively. Cement sales in the region grew by 15% although lower activity was noted in Canada. The group’s Europe Materials division reported an increase in sales revenue and EBITDA of 5% to US$5.43bn and 4% to US$609m respectively. However the company said that before sales and earnings in the region grew by 14% on a like-for-like basis. The group’s Building Products division - which supplies architectural products, infrastructure products and construction accessories – performed particularly well compared to the other sectors.

Albert Manifold, the chief executive officer of CRH, said “CRH has delivered another strong performance with further growth in sales, EBITDA and margin despite a challenging and volatile cost environment. This performance reflects the continued execution of our integrated and sustainable solutions strategy.”

Mexico: Cemex’s North American logistics subsidiary Cemex Servicios Logísticos has changed its name to Alliera. Alliera will continue its 15-year tradition of operating as an independent third-party logistics company, serving customers across various industries.

Cemex Mexico president Ricardo Naya said “For Alliera, Cemex’s strategic priorities are ensuring our collaborators’ health and safety, sustainability and innovation. Within this package of priorities, we always seek growth, as we do now with Alliera, which is part of Urbanisation Solutions, our most recently created business branch.”

Canada: Lafarge Canada has installed its first electric vehicle charging stations at its Kent Avenue ready-mix concrete batching plant in Vancouver, British Columbia. The company’s Vancouver team built the four stations with US$39,200 in funding from Lafarge Canada and US$15,700 in funding from BC Hydro’s CleanBC Go Electric Vehicle charger rebate programme. Dow Jones Institutional News has reported that the company plans to establish 96 further stations at 30 sites in British Columbia, Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. It says that the electric vehicle charging network will enable it to eliminate 188t of CO₂ emissions by 2028.

Lafarge Western Canada chief executive officer Brad Kohl said "We are thrilled that Western Canada has opened the first electric vehicle charging stations to kick-start this exciting effort planned across our Canada operations to advance our goal of net-zero as part of our environmental commitments."

Canada: The Canadian government’s Environment and Climate Change department has granted an extension to St Mary’s Cement to an order regarding alleged sticky dust emissions from its McInnis cement plant. The Journal de Québec newspaper has reported that the producer now has until 8 August 2022 to submit its observations on the situation. Environment and Climate Change Canada has identified 12 different equipment failures as contributors to the alleged illegal emissions. On 20 July 2022, it had received a total of 80 reports from the public about the situation.

Canada: Holcim has announced its acquisition of Mathers Group’s quarry and asphalt assets in Quebec. The group says that the acquisition will accelerate its development of local circular construction practices by expanding its recycled concrete offering.

Canada: Holcim subsidiary Lafarge Canada has announced that its Bath cement plant in Kingston, Ontario, is in the process of converting to the production of Holcim’s OneCem product, a low CO₂ Portland Limestone Cement (PLC) alternative. The plant currently makes general use (GU) cement.

"As the leader in the cement industry in eastern Canada, we are committed to developing our green portfolio and advancing towards a sustainable future, with OneCem as a step on the journey," said Andrew Stewart, Vice President for Cement at Lafarge Eastern Canada.

Robert Cumming, Head of Sustainability & Public Affairs for Eastern Canada, said "From 2018 to 2021 we have saved more than 140,000t of CO₂ by converting GU cement to OneCem in our plants across Ontario, Quebec and Nova Scotia - the equivalent to taking 42,891 cars off the road. With the recent conversion of the Bath Plant's GU production to OneCem, these numbers will continue to grow."

Canada: Lafarge Canada’s Richmond cement plant, one of the largest in British Columbia, has temporarily cut production, exacerbating a cement and concrete shortage in Vancouver, where some building firms have been forced to halt projects. The Richmond plant has been operating at limited capacity since a fire in the pre-heater tower on 31 May 2022.

Local press reported that the Richmond plant was ‘undergoing electric repairs to an isolated area,’ according to an emailed statement from the company. The company added "We expect to resume full production capacity shortly and are leveraging our strong production and supply network in an effort to minimize impact to our customers."

Canada/US: Lime company Lhoist North America raised the price of its lime products by up to 45% from 13 June 2022. The producer acknowledged the ‘challenging circumstance’ for all parties at an ‘unprecedented’ time. It said “We look forward to continuing to deliver the expected value to our customers.”

Canada/US: Holcim North America has invested in Blue Planet to support the development and commercialisation of its mineralisation technology. Blue Planet’s process sequesters CO₂ with building waste feedstock such as recycled concrete, cement kiln dust (CKD) and slag to produce new aggregate products. Each tonne of Blue Planet’s aggregate can mineralize up to 440kg of captured CO₂. Lafarge Canada, Holcim US, and Blue Planet will start a multi-year collaboration to help identify potential to use the mineralisation technology to further lower the carbon footprint of the companies’ cement, aggregates and concrete operations, with the potential to expand to other operations in the Holcim Group around the world.

“This is an important step for us in North America. Our vision is to transform our St Constant Plant in Montreal into a carbon campus that ultimately advances commercialisation of mineralisation technologies, including Blue Planet’s products,” said David Redfern, president and chief executive officer, Lafarge Canada. “We look forward to advancing our Net Zero strategy by leveraging mineralization technology that allows us to use the CO₂ from our own cement plants to produce carbon neutral or carbon negative sand and gravel products.”

Canada: Progressive Planet Solutions has successfully produced a new supplementary cementitious material (SCM) called PozDE from diatomaceous earth. The company says that it developed PozDE using calcium bentonite-containing diatomaceous earth from the Red Lake mine in Kamloops, British Colombia. The SCM’s seven-day and 28-day strength activity index (SAI) values are 101% and 120% those of ordinary Portland cement (OPC) respectively, while its water demand is lower at 98%.

Chief operating officer Ian Grant said “It is uncommon to see SCMs exceed the 7-day strength of the control Portland, so we are excited to see better strength while indicating lower water demand."