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One highlight from the cement industry news over the last month was Skyonic's announcement that it has opened a commercial-scale carbon capture unit at the Capitol Aggregates cement plant in Texas, US. Details were light, but the press release promised that the unit was expected to generate US$48m/yr in revenue for an outlay of US$125m. Potentially, the implications for the process are profound, so it is worth considering some of the issues here.

Firstly, it is unclear from the public information released whether the process will actually make a profit. The revenue figures for the Skyonic unit are predictions and are dependent on the markets that the products (sodium biocarbonate, hydrogen and chlorine) will be sold into. Skyonic CEO and founder, Joe Jones, has said in interview that the sodium-based product market by itself could only support 200 - 250 plants worldwide using this process. Worldwide there are over 2000 integrated cement plants. Since Jones is selling his technology his market prediction might well be optimistic. It is also uncertain how existing sodium biocarbonate producers will react to this new source of competition.

Secondly, Skyonic is hoping to push the cost of carbon capture down to US$20/t. Carbon dioxide (CO₂) capture and transportation varies between industries depending on the purity and concentration of the by-product. For example, in 2011 the US Energy Information Administration estimated the cost for CO₂ capture to range from US$36.10/t for coal and biomass-to-liquids conversion up to US$81.08/t for cement plants. The difference being that capturing CO₂ from cement plant flue gas emissions requires more cleaning or scrubbing of other unwanted chemicals such as mercury.

With these limitations in mind, Skyonic is placing itself in competition with the existing flue gas scrubbing market rather than the carbon capture market, since the level of CO₂ removal can be scaled to local legislation. Plus, SO_x, NO₂, mercury and other heavy metals can be removed in the process.

Back on carbon capture, Skyonic is securing finance for a process it calls Skycycle, which will produce calcium-based products from CO₂, with a pilot plant planned at Capitol Aggregates for late 2015. This puts Skyonic back amongst several other pilot projects that are running around the world.

Taiwan Cement and the Industrial Technology Research Institute inaugurated their calcium looping project pilot in mid-2013. It was last reported to have a CO₂ capture rate of 1t/hr.

The Norcem cement plant in Brevik, Norway started in early 2014 to test and compare four different types of post-combustion carbon capture technologies at its pilot unit. These are Aker Solutions Amine Technology, RTI Solid Sorbent Technology, DNV GL/ NTNU/ Yodfat Engineers Membrane Technology and Alstom Power Regenerative Calcium Cycle. The project in conjunction with HeidelbergCement and the European Cement Research Academy (ECRA) is scheduled to run until 2017.

St Marys Cement in St Marys, Canada started its bioreactor pilot project in July 2014. This process uses flue gas to grow algae that can then be used for bio-oil, food, fertiliser and sewage treatment.

If Skyonic is correct then its sodium biocarbonate process in Texas is a strong step towards cutting CO₂ emissions in the cement industry. Unfortunately, it looks like it can only be a step since the market won't support large-scale adoption of this technology. Other pilots are in progress but they are unlikely to gather momentum until legislation forces cement producers to adopt these technologies or someone devises a method that pays for the capture cost.

China: The board of directors of Anhui Conch have announced that Zhu Yuming has resigned as a supervisor of the company due to other work commitments. Zhu's resignation will be effective upon the appointment of a new supervisor to fill the vacancy. Anhui Conch have thanked Zhu for his 'invaluable' contributions to the company.

Sri Lanka: W Christopher Fernando has been appointed as an executive director to the board of Tokyo Cement Company (Lanka) with effect from 30 October 2014.

Fernando was appointed as Group General Manager of the company in 1991. He is also a director of Fuji Cement Company (Lanka), Tokyo Super Cement Company (Lanka), Tokyo Cement Colombo Terminal, Tokyo Cement Power (Lanka) and Tokyo Eastern Cement Company. He holds degrees in economics, is a Fellow Member of the Institute of Chartered Management Accountants (FCMA), Fellow Member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants (FCA) and an attorney-at-law.

Venezuela: The governor of Yaracuy, Julio Leon, has revealed that the government is developing a 600t/day cement plant in Peña under an agreement between Venezuela and India. The plant is due to start operation in late 2014. The area contains high-quality limestone deposits with applications for other industries other than cement.

The new plant will employ 200 people directly. It is part of a proposal made by the governors of Yaracuy, Cojedes and Portuguesa states to build three mini plants, with each having been allocated US$15m. Each plant will produce 4.5 million bags of cement per year. A distribution network will be set up to allow communities to access the cement at affordable prices.

Oman: Raysut Cement Company (RCC) intends to build a distribution terminal in Duqm and additional silo capacity at its Salalah cement plant. The company is also building an offshore unloader and blow pump system in the north of the country to facilitate bulk cement handling.

"The work is in a progressive stage and the company will reap benefits from these starting from the new facilities from the early part of 2015," said Ahmed bin Alawi bin Abdulla Al Ibrahim, chairman of Raysut Cement.

Russia: Lafarge's Voskresensk cement plant has set up a continuous environmental monitoring system analysing cement furnace emissions. Siemens has designed and delivered the equipment. The monitoring system controls standard parameters like the content of dust, nitrogen oxides, sulphur dioxide and carbon monoxide, oxygen, pressure, gas flow rate and organic content. Lafarge also has an environmental monitoring system installed at its Ferzikovo Cement Plant.

Armenia: Mika Cement has stopped production at its cement plant until February 2015. It reported to local media that it had produced the necessary volume of cement for sales and had now stopped for annual technical work. The company also said that it had paid the bulk of wage arrears and that the remaining debt will be paid before the end of 2014.

"The company repaid the biggest part of the arrears of wages to workers. In the period of the plant's suspension, the workers will be receiving salary in line with the legislation of the Republic of Armenia," said Mika Cement's press office.

Previously plant director Naira Martirosyan told Arminfo that the plant would produce 100,000t of cement by the end of 2014. The plant resumed production in September 2014 when salary and electric debts were settled. Production volumes at Mika Cement declined following the global economic recession in 2009. Although the company didn't publish financial results in 2013 its debt rose to over US$5.5m in 2012.

China/Russia: Eurocement plans to sign three contracts worth a combined US$280m at an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Beijing. The contracts cover the construction of dry-process cement lines at the Kavkazcement, Belgorodsky Cement and Oskolcement plants. Each line will have a clinkcer capacity of 6200t/yr or a cement capacity of 3Mt/yr. Each contract is for US$93.3m and the contractor is Sinoma International Engineering.

In May 2014 Eurocement signed six contracts to build new plants with Sinomach, CNBM and Sinoma for a total of US$580m. All of the projects are being carried out as part of a programme to switch to dry-process cement production. Overall investments in the programme will exceed US$2bn.

"We plan to switch our enterprises to the new technological platform in three years, between 2014 and 2017," said Eurocement president Mikhail Skorokhod. By 2018, Eurocement intends to produce 100% of its cement using the dry-process. This will boost capacities by 5Mt/yr to 45Mt/yr, according to Skorokhod.

Eurocement has calculated that the programme will pay for itself in 7 - 10 years. Cost of production is planned to fall by 35% - 40%. The debt/equity ratio of financing for the programme is 70%:30%. In May 2014, Eurocement signed a strategic agreement with Sberbank to finance its investment programme.

Germany: HeidelbergCement has reported that its operating income before depreciation (OIBD) increased by 10% to Euro866m in the third quarter of 2014 from Euro789m in the same period in 2013. It attributed the rise to price increases, declining energy prices and improvement in the performance of the building products business in North America and the UK.

"In the third quarter, we generated the best operating income since the financial crisis started in 2008," said chairman of the managing board Bernd Scheifele.

The Germany-based construction materials producer's revenue rose by 4% to Euro3.81bn. Cement and clinker sales rose by 3.3% to 23.1Mt for the quarter. For the year to date increases in profit, revenue and cement sales volumes have been broadly similar to the third quarter. However, net profit fell by 40% to Euro368m in the third quarter of 2014 due to a one-off effect related to tax expenses.

Nigeria: Lafarge's Nigerian business has entered into an agreement with Flour Mills of Nigeria to purchase a 30% stake of Nigeria's United Cement Company. The deal will give Lafarge complete control of United Cement Company.

"Pursuant to the agreement, the first 15% stake would be acquired in the first quarter of 2015, while the second 15% stake is scheduled to be acquired by February 2016 at the latest," said Lafarge.