India: Shree Cement has ordered a MVR 6000 C-6 mill from Germany’s Gebr. Pfeiffer. The mill will be used to grind cement at a grinding unit near Pune in the state of Maharashtra. No value for the order has been disclosed.

The new mill will be used to alternately produce 300t/hr of Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) at a product fineness of 3100cm²/g acc. to Blaine or 300t/hr of Portland Pozzolana Cement (PPC) containing as much as 35% of fly ash at a product fineness of 3500cm²/g acc. to Blaine or 180t/hr of ground granulated blast-furnace slag (GGBFS) at a product fineness of 4500 cm²/g acc. to Blaine. The mill will come equipped with a 6700kW drive.

Gebr. Pfeiffer SE will supply the core components of the mill and the gear unit from Europe and its Indian subsidiary, Gebr. Pfeiffer (India), will provide the components such as the housing of the mill and classifier, the steel foundation parts as well as the internal parts of the classifier. The Indian subsidiary will also design the plant layout and advise the customer on the equipment he will procure on his own.

Shree Cement has ordered 34 mills from Gebr. Pfeiffer previously. It has recently commissioned a grinding plant in Jharkand that also uses a mill supplied by Gebr. Pfeiffer.

Turkey: Sales from Sabancı Holding’s cement businesses fell by 5% year-on-year to Euro132m in the first half of 2019 from Euro139m in the same period in 2018. Its cost of goods sold grew by 7% during the same period. It made a net loss of Euro1.35m compared to a net profit of Euro23.3m previously. Overall, the group’s sales rose by 24% to Euro1.48bn but its profit fell by 17% to Euro577m.

Japan: Taiheiyo Cement’s sales fell by 2.1% year-on-year to US$1.94bn in the quarter to 30 June 2019 from US$1.99bn in the same period in 2018. Its profit dropped by 37.6% to US$58.7m from US$94.1m. It blamed falling sales on the end of construction booms linked to preparations for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, earthquake reconstruction work and the construction of Yatsuba Dam. Exports also fell.

Vietnam: 20 factories in Quang Ninh, Thanh Hoa, Quang Nam and Thua Thien Hue provinces will be subject to a new carbon tax in a pilot project. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has started to put the programme into action following approval from Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, according to the Vietnam News Agency Bulletin. The pilot project will start in 2020 and run until the end of 2021.

The scheme will include 11 cement companies and nine power plants. Cement producers and traders will be charged US$0.09/t of clinker, equivalent to US1.35/t of CO₂. The tax will also increase electricity costs for cement producers. It is expected to increase the production cost at plants by 0.29%.

Nguyen Van Vu, head of Finance and Planning Department under Vietnam Administration of Forestry (VAF), said that the tariff was lower than the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility pledge to pay for emission reduction efforts in North Central Region of US$5/t of CO2. The provinces running the tariff are expected to generate around US$7.4m/yr. Most of this revenue will be accrued in Quang Ninh, followed by Thanh Hoa, Thua Thien Hue and Quang Nam.