Displaying items by tag: Sustainability

India: JSW Cement has undertaken work to improve a dried-up canal in order make it a source of water for the irrigation needs of farmers in Bilakalaguduru village, Andhra Pradesh. The Hindu newspaper has reported that the JSW Cement team has redirected overflow water from a limestone quarry. JSW Cement also built a new temple to the gods Balaji and Varahaswamy in Nandyal, Andhra Pradesh using local black limestone.

Mexico: Cemex says that the ongoing coronavirus pandemic will not delay its ‘Climate Action Strategy’ that was previously announced in February 2020. The building materials producer has developed a CO₂ reduction roadmap to help guide it towards a towards a targeted 35% reduction in net specific CO₂ emissions between 1990 and 2030.

The roadmap consists of: reduction of CO₂ emissions of clinker through “the production of novel clinkers with lower heat consumption”; use of “alternative decarbonated raw materials”; increased alternative fuel substitution; and increased substitution of clinker with “alternative cementitious materials, using admixtures to enhance strength, and adopting new grinding technologies to improve performance”; in addition to the increased use of renewable energy.

Cemex chief executive officer (CEO) Fernando Gonzalez said, “Climate change is one of the biggest challenges of our time, and we believe that we can continue to address it as a fundamental component of our efforts to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.”

Germany: HeidelbergCement has published its sustainability report for 2019. The building materials producer says it decreased its specific gross CO₂ emissions per tonne of cement by 0.9% year-on-year to 622kg/t in 2019 from 628kg/t in 2018. Absolute net CO₂ emissions also fell, by 4.6% to 68.4Mt from 71.7Mt. Indirect CO₂ emission grew by 4.8% to 4.4Mt from 4.2Mt, though energy consumption in cement production fell by 3.5% to 364,000TJ from 377,000TJ.

HeidelbergCement chair Dominic von Achten said, “We have declared our express commitment to the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals. In particular, we will continue to intensify our commitment to tackling climate change in the coming years.”

Canada/US: Lehigh Cement says that it has adopted the latest North American Product Category Rules (PCR) across its entire product range.

Lehigh Hanson Canada regional cement sales and logistics vice president Shawn McMillan said, “We have made it one of our top priorities to benchmark and lower our CO₂ emissions with ambitious targets. Much like food nutrition labels highlight calorific values, our plant and product-specific environmental product declarations (EPD) communicate the environmental impact through global warming potential (GWP) for cement in a simple and easy-to-understand manner. We intend to use the added product transparency to more effectively gain adoption for our lower carbon products. We have several research projects and studies on-going to continue to optimise the carbon impacts from cement and concrete.”

France: LafargeHolcim France has said that all bagged cement will now bear a 360Score CO₂ emissions reduction rating, “to allow traders, artisans and homebuilders to know the precise carbon impact of their cement.” The rating, between ’A’ and ’D,’ corresponds to the factor of CO₂ compared to CEM-I Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC). ’A’ Class cement produces 75% – 100% less CO₂, while ’D’ class cement produces 0% – 25% less.

LafargeHolcim France chief executive officer (CEO) François Petry said, “By applying the 360Score rating scale to our bags of cements, we are continuing to implement our Lafarge 360 approach, which consists in supporting all builders to build in a more responsible manner.”

Austria: Lafarge Zementwerke, OMV, Verbund and Borealis have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) for the joint planning and construction of a full-scale plant by 2030 to capture CO₂ and process it into synthetic fuels, plastics or other chemicals. As part of the ‘Carbon2ProductAustria’ (C2PAT) project the companies intend to build the unit at the integrated Mannersdorf cement plant and capture all of the 0.7Mt/yr of CO₂ emitted.

"We are committed to leading the industry in reducing carbon emissions and shifting towards low-carbon construction. We have worked consistently and successfully on the reduction of the CO₂ footprint of our cement plants, products and solutions. Ultimately, CO₂-neutral cement production can only be possible with the implementation of breakthrough technologies, like carbon capture, which is why we have great expectations for the C2PAT project", said Lafarge’s local chief executive officer (CEO) José Antonio Primo.

The project aims to use hydrogen produced by Verbund to allow OMV to transform the captured CO₂ into a range of olefins, fuels and plastics. Borealis would then use some of these products as a feedstock to manufacture plastics. However, the companies say that, “taking the next steps towards a Zero CO₂ economy will require the right financial as well as favourable regulatory framework conditions. The success of C2PAT will largely depend on whether the right financial and regulatory framework conditions are created both at the European Union and Austrian national level.”

The joint project is designed in three phases. In phase one, the partners are currently evaluating and developing a joint strategy for project development, business modelling and process engineering. Based on the results of phase one, a cluster of industrial pilot plants in the Eastern part of Austria could be technically developed and built in the mid-2020s in phase two. Phase three entails building a full scale CO₂ capture and utilisation unit at a cement plant.

Lafarge Zementwerke is the Austrian subsidiary of building materials manufacturer LafargeHolcim. OMV produces and markets oil and gas, energy and other petrochemical products. Verbund is an Austrian-based electricity generator, with a focus on hydroelectric power. Borealis is a chemical company and a producer of polyolefins, base chemicals and fertilisers.

Germany: Schwenk Zement has announced plans for the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) from cement kiln CO₂ emissions. The World Ethanol and Biofuels Report has reported that Schwenk Zement’s integrated 1.0Mt/yr Allmendingen, Baden-Württemberg plant will receive a pilot SAF plant in late 2020.

France: CRH subsidiary EQIOM has announced a 9000t/yr reduction in its transport-related CO₂ emissions, down by 5% to 171,000t/yr for the past three years from 180,000t in 2017. It achieved the reduction through its commitment to the FRET21 initiative, a sustainable development strategy of the Agence de l’Environnement et de la Maîtrise de l’Énergie (ADEME) and Association des Utilisateurs de Transport de Fret (AFAT).

The initiative is based on CO₂ reduction around four key activities: loading rate; distance travelled; means of transport; and responsible purchasing. EQIOM launched five initiatives, including increasing laden returns of trucks to reduce empty transport to 28%, commissioning four new natural gas and bioethanol-powered vehicles and increasing rail freight to 89%.

EQIOM logistics manager Jérôme Becamel said, "As in the rest of the country, our transport activity has been impacted by the social situation, particularly strikes on the roads and in the railways. However, we are delighted with the results obtained for this first challenge even if we were unable to reach our ambitions 100%. We are only more motivated and we will be stepping up our efforts over the next three years.”

UK/Germany: The World Green Building Council has announced that HeidelbergCement is an official partner of its Europe Regional Network. HeidelbergCement joins 4500 other companies across Europe in supporting the regional network’s work towards networking leaders, raising awareness, proposing policy and providing assessment, certification and information.

HeidelbergCement chair Dominik von Achten said, “Together with the Europe Regional Network of the World Green Building Council, we now want to further intensify the promotion of sustainability and innovation in the construction sector. In this way, we are accelerating the development towards a carbon-neutral construction industry, and ultimately towards a carbon-neutral society in Europe.”

Germany: The Nature and Biodiversity Conservation Union (NABU) has awarded a placard to Opterra’s 2.3Mt/yr integrated Karsdorf plant, declaring that a multi-purpose facility at the plant in Saxony-Anhalt is a “martin-friendly house.” The company says that the building is the first industrial facility to receive the accreditation, after becoming the home to 60 breeding pairs of house martins. Opterra Karsdorf head of mining Axel Horn said, “For us, active environmental and biodiversity protection means protecting and respecting nature, even during limestone extraction. Animals and plants established here will find ideal living conditions.”