Displaying items by tag: Production
Spain: HeidelbergCement subsidiary HeidelbergCement Hispania has informed clients that its plants remain open ‘in order to continue to provide required products and services, combining this availability with the mandatory security measures.’ Deliveries and collections continue, subject to the requirements of its Prevention and Safety protocol. In the interests of safety, HeidelbergCement Hispania’s service team has replaced most site visits with additional telephone services.
Turkmen producers to produce basalt cement
04 May 2020Turkmenistan: Cabinet of Ministers’ Deputy Chair Shamuhammet Durdylyev has announced plans for the country to produce a new grade of cement. Turkmenpor News has reported that the cement, designated 500-G20-K, will contain basalt porphyries. Durdylyev has said that the Ufra deposit in the Balkan region of western Turkmenistan will supply the basalt porphyries, adding, “These mineral substances significantly improve the quality of cement.”
The move’s aim is reportedly to boost Turkmen cement plants’ productivity without increasing the reliance on imports.
Peru: Total cement volumes in March 2020 were 0.42Mt, down by 51% year-on-year from 0.86Mt in March 2019 and down by 51% month-on-month from 0.85Mt in February 2020. Clinker volumes fell by 51% to 0.35Mt from 0.71Mt in March 2019 – down by 55% month-on-month from 0.78Mt in 2020.
Peru’s March cement exports were 6200t, down by 46% year-on-year from 11,400Mt in March 2019 and 55% month-on-month from 13,700Mt in February 2020. Imports in March 2020 were 102,000t, down by 3.6% year-on-year from 106,000t and up by 2150% month-on-month from 5000Mt.
Domestic demand fell by 47% year-on-year and 48% month-on-month to 0.49Mt, from 0.92Mt and 0.94Mt respectively.
Hanson team makes sign to thank National Health Service
27 April 2020UK: A team of Hanson employees has produced a sign from recycled materials from around the company’s 1.0Mt/yr Purfleet slag cement grinding plant. The 6m-long luminous sign, which reads ‘NHS Thank You,’ has been installed at the plant on the mill three tower overlooking the QE2 Dartford Crossing. Hanson Purfleet plant manager Warren Scott said, “The team wanted to show their appreciation for the NHS and key workers and came up with and executed this idea in their own time.”
Hanson has kept ‘a number of key sites’ open through the coronavirus outbreak in order ‘to supply key national infrastructure projects or to provide maintenance materials to critical sectors.’ Hanson has furloughed part of its staff under the government’s Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.
Demand down as production partially resumes in India
24 April 2020India: Both Germany-based HeidelbergCement and Aditya Birla subsidiary UltraTech have responded to the government’s partial lifting of the coronavirus lockdown for rurally-located continuous industries by resuming ‘partial operations in some production facilities.’ Orient Cement subsidiary CK Birla said, “We are in the process of partially resuming our operations at our plants in Karnataka and Maharashtra.” Producers require the permission of the relevant state government to restart plants. In Telangana, where the government has not lifted the lockdown, CK Birla’s facilities remain shut.
The Economic Times newspaper has reported that ‘limited transportation facilities, higher than usual inventory and stricter rules regarding labour safety’ have added a note of caution to resumed operations. Shree Cement managing director Hari Mohan Bangur said, given the continuation of restrictions on construction in cities, “We expect just 10% of normal consumption, with hopes of a gradual increase.”
Cement and Concrete Association of Malaysia welcomes return to cement production and lobbies for construction to resume
24 April 2020Malaysia: The Cement and Concrete Association of Malaysia (CCA) has praised the government’s decision to grant an exception to cement plants in order to allow production to resume in the third phase of the country’s lockdown, beginning on 28 April 2020. The Straits Times newspaper has reported that the current and previous stages of the lockdown have exacerbated the cement sector’s losses over the past two years.
The CCA said that the development ‘will have a multiplier effect on the economy.’ CCA chair Datuk Yeoh Soo Keng said that 100,000 jobs ‘depend either directly and indirectly on cement production,’ including many ‘in small and medium enterprises’ that will not survive the outbreak without it. “Cement is the fundamental building material of our country’s wealth,” he added. The CCA thanked the government for the ‘welcome reprieve’ and urged it to allow ‘related sectors to slowly and gradually resume operations, for the industry to effectively function.’
Salonit Anhovo suspends production
24 April 2020Slovenia: Salonit Anhovo suspended production from 20 April 2020 to 4 May 2020. SeeNews has reported the reason for the suspension as a lack of demand from its usual Italian and Slovenian markets amid the ongoing coronavirus crisis. Salonit Anhovo management board member Dejan Zwitter said, "We expect domestic sales to stabilise as the government is providing incentives for construction activities."
The company will continue to serve its customers with deliveries of it products.
Belgorodsky Cement opens packing and palletising line
23 April 2020Russia: Eurocement subsidiary Belgorodsky Cement has dispatched the first batch of bagged cement from the new packing and palletising line at its 3.8Mt/yr integrated plant in Belgorod West, Belgorod Oblast. The 70t/hr-capacity line produces 50kg cement bags on pallets of 1.7t (34 bags).
Eurocement has also announced the first delivery of cement from its Belgorodsky Cement plant to Yaroslavl, Tolyatti and Nizhny Novgorod by river in 2020. Eurocement senior vice president Alexander Sapronov said, “The delivery of products by river transport is one of the most cost-effective methods of transportation. High-quality loading and reliable packaging guarantee consumers complete cargo safety.”
Eurocement has continued production throughout the coronavirus outbreak, but has restricted meetings, conferences and training sessions since 23 March 2020. The Group said, “Eurocement products are strategically important to the nation's economy. In order to ensure smooth operation of production facilities and of the group as a whole, measures have been taken to minimise the risk of spreading the coronavirus.” These include: ‘regular health check-ups and temperature measurements for employees and subcontractors, air disinfection, antiseptic treatment of operational surfaces, provision of skin antiseptics in toilets and informing employees about safety recommendations.’
Japan: Taiheiyo Cement has partnered with JFE Steel and the Global Institute for Environmental Technology to develop a carbon capture and storage system. The system will use wet alkaline earth metals extracted from steel slag to produce carbonates from exhaust gases at cement and steel plants. The partners are investigating the possibility of using these carbonates, specifically calcium carbonate and magnesium carbonate, as additives in cement production at Taiheiyo Cement’s plants. Taiheiyo Cement president Masafumi Shigehara said, “With the effects of climate change becoming apparent both in Japan and overseas, the importance of global warming counter-measures is increasing.”
Russia: Sibirskiy Cement produced 525,000t of cement at its three plants in the first quarter of 2020, up by 14% year-on-year from 460,000t in the corresponding period of 2019. The 3.7Mt/yr Topkinskiy Cement plant produced 388,000t, up by 21% year-on-year from 320,000t; the 1.1Mt/yr Krasnoyarsk Cement plant produced 97,600t, down by 17% year-on-year from 118,000t and the Timluy Cement plant produced 39,600t, up by 73% year-on-year from 22,9000t. Sibirskiy Cement’s first vice president Gennady Rasskazov said, “Cement consumption in Siberia, Buryatia and the Trans-Baikal Territory reached 845,000t in the first three months of 2020, up by 15% year-on-year from 735,000t.” He said that April 2020 has brought a ‘significant decrease in demand,’ and revised Sibirskiy Cement’s projected 2020 sales to an estimated decrease of 7-10% from 3-5% growth. Over a two-and-a-half-month period, Rasskazov predicted a 30-50% sales fall.