Displaying items by tag: UK
New national technical manager for Hanson Cement
09 October 2019UK: Dr Nina Cardinal has joined Hanson Cement as its new national technical manager. She heads up the division’s technical team, which offers customers advice, information and support on all cement and cementitious issues.
Nina previously worked at Tata Speciality Steels for more than 20 years, latterly as technical director responsible for a 70-strong team, before joining the University of Sheffield as director of operations in the Faculty of Science in 2016.
“I am delighted to join the Hanson team,” said Cardinal. “I am looking forward to building on our market-leading technical support and working with our customers to ensure they get the best possible customer service.”
Mark Hickingbottom, commercial director bulk products, added, “Nina has an excellent understanding of product and service development and will be working with customers and operational teams across our cement and concrete business lines.”
Steppe revenue descends
09 October 2019Kazakhstan: Steppe Cement has announced that its revenue fell by 10% during the third quarter of 2019 on the back of lower sales volumes. The UK-listed, Kazakhstan-based producer of construction materials said that revenue for the third quarter was US$27.0m compared with US$29.9m in the year earlier period. The company said that sales volumes for the quarter fell by 11% to 576,692t. For the first nine months of 2019, Steppe Cement’s revenue rose by 10% to US$630m.
The Global Cement and Concrete Association launches environmental product declaration tool
08 October 2019UK: The Global Cement and Concrete Association (GCCA) has launched the GCCA Industry EPD Tool (Version 2.0) to support the publication of environmental product declarations (EPDs) by cement and concrete producers. Originally commissioned by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development Cement Sustainability Initiative, the new GCCA Industry EPD Tool includes the latest database of energy impacts from cement production from across the world, supporting the output of more accurate EPD data. The GCCA is making the tool available to all producers and organisations in the cement and concrete industry to increase availability to designers and clients of EPDs to support the sector deliver a sustainable built environment.
“We are committed to supporting the cement and concrete industry to reduce its environmental impact and support global sustainability goals. With the launch of the new EPD Tool, we are enabling the industry and its customers to better quantify and verify the life cycle environmental impact of existing products and to develop lower-impact products in the future,” said Andrew Minson, GCCA Concrete and Sustainable Construction Director.
The GCCA Industry EPD Tool has been developed by Quantis, verified by Studio Fieschi, and the GCCA says it is the first industry tool in the International EPD System. It is based on internationally recognised standards and product category rules.
Aggregate Industries buys Maxi Readymix Concrete in the UK
07 October 2019UK: Aggregate Industries has acquired Maxi Readymix Concrete, an independent readymix concrete (RMX) business based in Leicestershire and the East Midlands. The company operates a Betomix 2.66m3 twin shaft wet batch plant capable of producing 110m3/hr of compacted concrete with a silo capacity of 400t and aggregate capacity of 650t. It was supplied by Germany’s Liebherr and commissioned in 2014.
Hanson opens new concrete plant in southern UK
07 October 2019UK: Hanson has opened a new ready-mixed concrete (RMX) plant in Rochester, Kent, to supply growing demand for construction projects in the South East. The new unit replaces the subsidiary of HeidelbergCement’s former concrete plant in the town. The group says it provides increased capacity, improved productivity, lower power consumption and reduced ongoing maintenance costs.
Fuchs building new materials warehouse in the UK
01 October 2019UK: Fuchs Lubricants is building a new Euro5.5m raw materials warehouse at its headquarters in Staffordshire. Work on the project started in August 2019 and it is due for completion in the second quarter of 2020. Once completed it will ‘significantly’ increased the amount of raw materials the business can store on-site.
The warehouse will have a capacity of approximately 4000 pallet spaces, with ability for automatic or manual storage place allocation. Two wire-guided driverless Very Narrow Aisle trucks will operate in the unit. Warehouse Control and Warehouse Management Systems will streamline the process, with benefits including goods receipt entry and booking, a paperless put away process, inventory support and batch traceability.
Aggregate Industries announces new digital customer service platform
20 September 2019UK: Aggregate Industries will launch a digital customer service platform in September 2019. The platform, called Loop, will offer Order Tracking, which gives customers real-time delivery information.
National Parks appoint Tarmac lead partner
20 September 2019UK: The body responsible for the UK’s 15 National Parks has acknowledged the building materials and construction company Tarmac as its lead partner in recognition of its sustainable practice at the UK National Parks Conference at the Yorkshire Dales National Park headquarters. The Conference on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the inauguration of the National Parks was supported by Tarmac.
Cemex installs Patol’s heat-detection cables
05 September 2019UK: Cemex has installed Patol’s Firesense linear heat detection cable (LHDC) at its 1.8Mt/yr integrated cement plant in Rugby. The installation uses a digital interface to monitor a zonal length of LHDC which will detect any overheating in the plant’s lubrication systems.
University of Dundee study looks at fly ash moisture
02 September 2019UK: A study by the University of Dundee has dispelled the myths of substantial performance differences between concretes made with cement containing dry or wet-stored fly ash, with comparable reinforcement corrosion between the two.
Vertical News has reported that the research, whose backers included the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs and Heathrow Airport Holdings, was aimed at “quantifying moisture effects, which indicate agglomeration of fly ash and a tendency for this to increase with free lime content, storage period and temperature.”
Researchers tested five moistened fly ashes and samples from two power station stockpiles, and further investigated different material and storage variables, comparing the concretes at 75mm slump and 28 day strength. Air permeability and water absorption of moistened fly ash proved greater with high free lime (up to 0.9%) and lower with low free lime (to under 0.1%). What benefits there were improved with longer storage. The moistening of low-free-lime fly ash generally yielded similar, or slightly higher, carbonation and chlorine diffusion. The moisture caused little change in high-free-lime ash’s carbonation, while increasing chloride diffusion. Furthermore, high storage temperature equated to greater carbonation.
In spite of these intriguing chemical differences, the study concluded, "these didn't seem to have a noticeable effect on concrete resistance.”