Displaying items by tag: Cementownia Warta

Poland: Cementownia Warta has ordered a BPB-SF heavy-duty arched plate conveyor for the new limestone crushing facility at its Warta integrated cement plant from Germany-based Aumund. The supplier says that it will deliver the equipment before the end of 2020.

Aumund said that it has delivered “more than 20 machines” to the Warta plant since the producer placed its first order with the company in 1998. In 2020 it delivered five KZB pan conveyors of a total capacity of 2300t/hr as part of a project to construct a 120,000t steel-roofed concrete silo at the plant.

The European Union’s (EU) verified CO₂ emissions figures were released earlier this week on 1 April 2019. The good news is that no cement plant is within the top 100 largest emitters. All the top spots are held by power plants, iron and steel producers and the odd airline. Indeed, out of all of the verified emissions, cement clinker or lime production only represents 7% of the total emissions. Of course this is too much if the region wants to meet its climate change commitments but it is worth remembering that other industries have a long way to go as well and they don’t necessarily face the intrinsic process challenges that clinker production has. If the general public or governments are serious about cutting CO₂ emissions then they might consider, for example, taking fewer flights with airlines before picking on the cement industry.

The EU emitted 117Mt of CO₂ from its clinker and lime producers in 2018, a 2.7% year-on-year decrease compared to 120Mt in 2017. This compares to 158Mt in 2008, giving a 26% drop in emissions over the decade to 2018. However, there are two warnings attached to this data. First, there are plants on this list that have closed between 2008 and 2018. Second, there are plants that provided no data in 2018, for example, all the plants in Bulgaria. Climate change think tank Sandbag helpfully pointed out in its analysis of the EU emissions data that industrial emissions have barely decreased since 2012. The implication here being that the drop from 2008 to 2012 was mainly due to the economic recession. Sandbag also made the assertion that 96% of the cement industry’s emissions were covered by free allocations in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) thereby de-incentivising sector willingness to decarbonise.

By country the emissions in 2018 from cement and lime roughly correspond with production capacity, although this comes with the caveat that emissions link to actual production not potential capacity. So, Germany leads followed by Spain, Italy, Poland and France. Of these Poland is a slight outlier, as will be seen below.

Table 1: Top 10 CO₂ emitting plants in the European Union in 2018. Source: European Commission.

Poland leads the count in the top 10 EU CO₂ emitting cement plants in 2018 with five plants. Greece follows with two plants. This list is deceptive as all of these plants are large ones with production capacities of 2Mt/yr and above. As it contains many of the largest plants in the EU no wonder the emissions are the highest. It is also worth considering that there are far larger plants outside of the EU.

In summary, as most readers will already know, the cement industry is a significant minority CO₂ emitter in the EU. Countries with larger cement sectors emit more CO₂ as do larger plants. So far, so obvious. Emissions are down since 2008 but this mostly seems to have stalled since 2012, bar a blip in 2017. The change though has been the rising carbon price in the EU ETS in 2018. Coincidentally the carbon price has been fairly low and stable since 2012. If the mechanism is working properly then changes should start to appear in 2019. Already in 2018 a few European cement producers announced plant closures and blamed the carbon price. Watch this space.

The Global Future Cement Conference & Exhibition on low and zero CO2 cement production will take place in Brussels, Belgium on 22 - 23 May 2019

Poland: The court of appeal has supported a decision by the Office for Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) in 2009 to fine six cement producers for cartel-like behaviour. However, the total fine has been reduced by one third to Euro67m from Euro98.3m, according to the Polish News Bulletin.

Grupa Ozarow is to pay Euro22.1m, Cemex Polska Euro16.6m, Gorazdze Cement Euro12.3m, Dyckerhoff Polska Euro7.51m, Cementownia Warta Euro5.55m and Cementownia Odra Euro2.87m. Some companies had their fines reduced by the court of appeal. Dyckerhoff will pay Euro7.5m instead of Euro13m and Cemex Polska will pay Euro5.88 less than the original fine. Some of the companies involved are considering appealing to the Supreme Court.

Poland: Cementownia Warta and Cementownia Odra have joined the Pewny Cement certification scheme run by the Polish Cement Association. The kite mark is intended to convey high specification standards in production, packaging and distribution for customers outside of the construction industry. Warta and Odra join LafargeHolcim, Górażdże Cement, Cement Ożarów and Cemex on the scheme.

Poland: The Court of Competition and Consumer Protection (SOKiK) has upheld a decision by the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) to fine seven cement companies for forming a cartel. However, the SOKiK lowered the total fine from Euro100m to Euro80m. According the UOKiK the cartel fixed prices and divided the Polish market among themselves for at least eleven years.

According to the UOKiK the cartel activities could have had negative consequences for the construction sector and had affected consumers. The cartel had almost 100% share of production and sale of grey cement in Poland.

During the investigation two cartel members decided to co-operate with the UOKiK in exchange for leniency. Therefore UOKiK decided not to fine Lafarge Cement and lowered the fine for Gorazdze Cement. The remaining five cartel members - Grupa Ozarow, Cemex Polska, Dyckerhoff Polska, Cementownia Warta and Cementownia Odra - were fined to the full legal extent, 10% of annual turnover.