Displaying items by tag: Plant

Indonesia: Semen Gresik, a subsidiary of Semen Indonesia, will receive a non-cash loan facility worth US$123m from the lender to build a new 3Mt/yr cement plant in Rembang regency, Central Java.

Cement producer PT Semen Gresik, subsidiary of state-owned PT Semen Indonesia, has secured a letter of credit (L/C) facility to help finance the construction of its newest plant. Under the deal, Abdul Rachman, the state lender of Bank Mandiri, agreed to issue L/Cs for Semen Gresik for the next 42 months to support the purchase of machinery or equipment from overseas. The equipment will be used to construct Semen Gresik's new plant in Rembang, Central Java. The plant is worth US$325m and is expected to commence operations in 2016 with a cement production capacity of 3Mt/yr.

The plants will be operated by subsidiary PT Semen Padang and are currently able to produce up to 6.5Mt/yr of cement. "We are looking to increase the annual capacity by 3Mt/yr and the project will need around US$281m in investment," said Semen Indonesia finance director, Ahyanizzaman. "About half of the costs will be financed by our internal funds and the rest by a syndicated loan, led by Mandiri." Supported by the Rembang and Indarung plants, Semen Indonesia's total production capacity will surge to 40Mt/yr by 2017, from the 31.8Mt/yr that has been forecast for 2014.

Sri Lanka: Work on Thatta Cement's cement grinding, storing and bagging plant in Sri Lanka has come to a screeching halt.

The company informed investors on 14 March 2014 that the project was 'temporarily suspended' as the Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) had not executed the Land Lease Agreement (LLA), despite the fact that basic engineering of the project had been completed by Thatta Cement Company (Pvt) Ltd, a subsidiary of Thatta Cement Company.

The CFO and company secretary of Thatta Cement, Muhammad Taha Hamdani, complained that the SLPA had also signed an agreement with another business venture of car trans-shipment in close vicinity to the proposed cement project, "Without anticipating the expected operational conflict, which now appears to hinder setting up the proposed cement project within the layout originally planned by the SLPA."

The company official stated that further progress on the project would recommence as soon as the LLA is signed with the SLPA.

Nigeria: The United Cement Company of Nigeria Limited (Unicem) is investing US$510m in an additional 2.5Mt/yr state-of-the-art cement line to double its existing capacity to 5Mt/yr by 2016.

Sinoma Group is constructing the 2.5Mt/yr new cement line. The project includes the construction of a new 45MW captive power plant by Wärtsilä Nigeria Limited. Work on the project has already started.

Managing director of Unicem, Olivier Leonir, said that cement demand had continued to grow nationally and regionally, especially within the south and south-east regions, with demand currently growing at about 12%/yr.

Leonir said that the project has a lot of economic and social benefits to the people of Cross River state and its neighbouring communities, adding that, "Unicem has a strong commitment to develop local capacity through various initiatives such as the Unicem Community Development Initiative (UCID) and the Graduate Trainee Scheme. We have been enlisting and training young people from the community as mechanical technicians and training young graduate engineers to fill the local manpower gap."

Leonir said that Unicem is also building a US$30.4m 20km cement road infrastructure to cater for the expected traffic increase and to reduce the movement of articulated vehicles within Calabar when the project is completed.

Myanmar: Thailand's Siam Cement Group (SCG) aims to produce nearly 2Mt/yr of cement at its new plant in Myanmar once the US$400m plant starts operations in 2016.

"Our new plant in the country is expected to produce 5000t/day, which is about 2Mt/yr," said Chana Poomee, country director of SCG in Myanmar. "We see a lot of potential in Myanmar because we consider it an Asean 'mid-land.' There are very good opportunities here. We believe in the future of Myanmar, so we've decided to invest," he said. He noted that construction had progressed well, with full support from the government and Mon State.

A new 20km road is being constructed while the company repairs many roads in the state. The SCG country director also emphasised that the company had launched a number of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities to improve the lives of people in Myanmar, which include public health and medical programmes, educational support for students and community-building activities. The firm's CSR activities also include building new schools near the plant, mobile clinics that will provide medical services to the people and renovation of pagodas in Mon State.

"We hope to be able to improve the livelihoods of people in Myanmar through economic, social and environmental development, just as SCG is doing in the other markets that it operates in," Chana said.

He added that the local residents were satisfied with the implementation of the new cement plant. "It took a long time for us to discuss the project with the government and the people. I am sure the local people will be satisfied with our plant thanks to our community-building programmes, which will be beneficial to all of them," said Chana.

In recent months, the firm has begun engaging with the communities around the plant site to inform them about the planned developments. "We will introduce environmentally friendly technology such as waste-heat power generation and greenhouse-gas reduction. It may be better than our plant in Thailand because of the up-to-date technology that will be used in this plant," Chana said.

Vietnam: Prime minister Nguyen Tan Dung has approved a proposal from the Ministry of Construction to expand the production capacity of Xuan Thanh cement plant in the northern province of Ha Nam to 4.5Mt/yr from the current 2.3Mt/yr.

The prime minister asked the ministry to review the planning of the cement industry, to remove low capacity cement projects from planning and to report to the government in June 2014. The government leader earlier added Xuan Thanh cement plant to the list of projects slated for operation before 2015.

India: Reliance Cement's 2Mt/yr cement plant in Rae Bareli in the state of Utter Pradesh has become operational. The company's aim is to capitalise on the huge demand-supply gap in the state, according to chief executive officer Arvind Pathak.

At present, the cement market in Utter Pradesh is estimated at around 26Mt/yr, while the total cement production in the state stands at about 16Mt/yr, leaving a 10Mt/yr shortfall. Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra are among the top cement consuming states in India. Pathak said the cement market was expected to grow by 6%/yr in the near future and that Reliance Cement was well positioned and equipped to fulfil the gap in demand and supply.

The company has invested about US$82.2m in the Rae Bareli plant, which will also consume about 600,000t/yr of fly ash. Reliance Cement's subsidiary, Reliance Power, which runs a 1200MW thermal power plant in Shahjahanpur district, will transport fly ash generated from its unit to the cement plant for consumption. "We aim to become among the top-three cement companies in India with total capacity of 50Mt/yr," Pathak added.

The company is also developing two 5Mt/yr capacity cement plants at Maihar, Madhya Pradesh and Yavatmal, Maharashtra.

UK: Commissioning has started on the repaired plant at the flood-damaged Cemex cement works at South Ferriby, UK and production will be resumed imminently.

The breakthrough comes three months after the plant, which employs 150 staff, was put out of action by a tidal surge from the nearby River Humber. A Cemex spokesman said, "Commissioning has started on the cement mill, which has been upgraded and improved since the flood on 5 December 2013. It has been a very long and complex process but we hope production will resume very soon."

Normally the 76-year-old plant produces around 800,000t/yr of cement so the loss of production over three months will mount to 200,000t.

The local employees have been retained on full pay since 5 December 2013 when the tidal surge saw the River Humber burst its banks and swamp the plant with millions of litres of water. The most serious damage was caused to the site's electrical network.

India: Reliance Cement plans to construct a US$555m cement plant in Shimla district, which has now been approved by the Himachal Pradesh government. Reliance Cement proposes manufacturing cement and clinker at the plant, which will provide employment for 350 people and will be commissioned at Chaupal, Himachal Pradesh.

Algeria: ThyssenKrupp Industrial Solutions has received an order to build a 6000t/day cement plant for Société des Ciments de Ain El Kebira (SCAEK), a subsidiary of Groupe Industriel des Ciments d'Algérie (GICA). The cement plant will be built in Ain El Kebira with start-up planned for 2016.

The order includes the supply of components for raw material processing, clinker manufacture and cement loading, the installation of a laboratory automation system for quality assurance and monitoring and the turnkey handover of the plant to the customer.

The key components are a 2000t/hr crusher for limestone and marl, a 500t/hr crusher for aggregates and a 50,000t capacity circular blending bed. Raw materials will be ground in two Polysius QUADROPOL QMR2 roller mills, with a throughput 350t/hr and a 30,000t homogenising silo will be used to store raw meal.

The kiln line comprises a five-stage, two-string PREPOL AS preheater, a 5.2 x 78m rotary kiln and a Polysius POLYTRACK cooler with intermediate crusher. Cement grinding will be carried out in three ball mills with high-efficiency SEPOL separators (5 x 14.5m, 6000kW central drive). Four storage silos each with a capacity of 20,000t of cement, four packaging lines, and six automatic and two manual loaders round out the plant. The Polysius POLAB laboratory automation system will be installed for quality monitoring and control.

Nigeria: Lafarge WAPCO intends to double its cement production capacity in Nigeria to 16Mt/yr with an investment of US$1.37bn by 2018. The proposed investment will enable Lafarge to complete the expansion of its cement plant in Calabar and the Ashaka Cement plant.

"Between 2009 and 2012 we invested over US$1.37bn in our operations," said Country Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Nigeria and Benin Republic, Guillaume Roux. He added that the expansion plan is in support of Nigeria's backward integration policy in cement production.

On a separate issue, Roux stated that a recent spate of building collapses was not caused by poor quality cement. He blamed the collapses on structural designs and poor usage of building materials by project handlers. He denied the existence of substandard cement in Nigeria, stating that "in Lafarge we put the control of the quality of cement at the forefront of our operation because we want to deliver very good quality products and services."