Displaying items by tag: Limestone

Brazil: Votorantim Cimentos plans to open a limestone grinding plant at Nobres. in Mato Grosso state to produce agricultural lime. The unit will have a production capacity of 0.7Mt/yr, according to the Valor newspaper. Once the new plant is opened in the second quarter of 2019 the company will have a total agricultural lime production capacity of 4.5Mt/yr.

The initiative is part of the building materials group’s plans to diversify its business. For the agricultural lime market it is targeting Central-West, Central-North and Northeast parts of Brazil. The Nobres plant can also produce 0.25Mt/yr of limestone filler for farm use. Following the upgrade to the Nobres plant it will be able to produce 0.75Mt/yr of dolomitic and calcitic limestone. These limestone products both have agricultural applications as soil nutrients.

Kenya/South Africa: Kenya’s ARM Cement is fighting moves by minority investors in South Africa’s Mafeking Cement to buy it out for a nominal sum. ARM Cement is attempting to sell its 70% stake in the company for around US$3m as part of its administration process, according to the Business Daily newspaper. Mafeking Cement owns limestone reserves in north-west South Africa and ARM Cement originally took a stake in the company to raise investment and eventually build a cement plant.

However, the minority investors have invoked parts of the shareholders’ agreement and filed a court application in South Africa that, if successful, would allow them buy out ARM Cement’s stake for a nominal price less than US$1. ARM Cement’s administrators PricewaterhouseCoopers have taken steps to counter the move.

Bolivia: SEDEM, the government’s business development agency, has refuted accusations that a new cement plant being built in Caracollo, Oruro does not have enough water or raw materials. Patricia Ballivián, the general manager of SEDEM, presented reports from PricewaterhouseCoopers and C & C Ingeniería y Procesos defending the supplies to the unit. The reports were released in response to accusations by a local politician that the project had been poorly planned.

The reports revealed that the Empresa Publica Productiva Cementos de Bolivia’s (ECEBOL) plant will recycle the industrial portion of its water supply. It will have a supply of 4l/s and a 3.5Ml reservoir. It also has limestone, gypsum and clay reserves sufficient for the production of 100Mt of cement. These are expected to last the plant 60 years.

Serbia: Elektroprivreda Srbije, a government-owned power company, has completed a Euro14m terminal on the River Danube for its Kostolac B coal-fired power plant. The unit will be use to transport 105,000t/yr of synthetic gypsum and 157,000/yr of fly ash. It will also process limestone. The terminal was built as part of the first phase of a credit arrangement between Serbia and China.

UK: Thamesport Cement, a subsidiary of France’s Cem’In’Eu, has applied for planning permission to build a grinding plant at the London Thamesport seaport on the Isle of Grain in Kent. The unit is expected to cost around Euro21m.

It is proposed that all the mineral raw materials will be imported by sea and the finished cement will then be transported by road either in bulk or in bags. Around 0.48Mt/yr of raw materials will be imported to the site, comprising 24,000t/yr of gypsum, 72,000t/yr of limestone and 384,000t/yr of clinker. Ships will be unloaded using cranes at the wharf. The plant will have six silos with a capacity of 500t for finished products. It is expected to create 35 full time jobs.

Taiwan: Taiwan Cement has reassured the public about the quality and safety standards of its cement and other products. It follows fraud charges being issued to a former government official for supplying raw materials mixed with industrial waste to the cement producer, according to the Taipei Times. Taiwan Cement says it is conducting inspections on all raw materials, including taking random samples of the top and bottom layers of delivery trucks from suppliers.

Lai Chin-kun, a former Hualien County Council speaker, secured local government contracts for his family’s companies to dispose of industrial waste, including industrial byproducts and inorganic debris from electroplating, optoelectronics and display panel manufacturers and pulp paper processing companies. Another family company won a contract with Taiwan Cement in 2010 to supply limestone, clay, sand and other raw materials required for cement production.

Prosecutors allege that when supplying raw materials to Taiwan Cement, Lai instructed company drivers to fill the bottom half of the trucks with industrial waste and place natural materials, such as clay, sand and limestone, on the top half to fool inspectors. Lai reportedly made US$14.1m from the scheme from 2010 to 2015.

Sweden: Cementa’s Skövde plant working on project to optimise its grinding process and reduce the clinker factor of the cement it produces. The project is looked at grinding limestone separately as opposed to grinding it with clinker and gypsum, which it currently does. The plant is using a mill it only uses occasionally to grind the limestone to the desired size. A full-scale trial was run in the autumn of 2018. Products from the trial are now being tested at a laboratory.

India: JSW Cement is planning to target the north and north-east of the country after a proposed initial public offering (IPO) in 2020. The company is looking for acquisitions in the region to meet its production capacity target of 20Mt/yr by 2020, according to a company executive quoted by the Economic Times newspaper. The cement producer has purchased two limestone mines via auction at Nagaur in Rajasthan and one in Gujarat. It is also considering building new cement plants near the mines. The company has a production capacity is 12.8Mt/yr at present.

Nepal: A limestone ban in the Katari municipality has hit Saurya Cement and Cosmos Cement. The local government has banned cement producers from extracting and transporting limestone on tax grounds, according to the Himalayan Times newspaper. However, Saurya Cement said that the authorities had stopped the transportation of limestone without consultation. Krishnaraj Dulal, the director Cosmos Cement, added that the company was not required to pay tax locally as it was paying the Department of Mines at the national level.

India: Kesoram Industries has received approval from the state government of Karnataka to buy 675 acres of land for mining limestone reserves. The subsidiary of BK Birla Group plans to use the acquisition to increase its existing limestone reserves, according to the Hindu newspaper. The amount the cement producer will pay for the land is still being negotiated and will be paid over a two-year period.