US: The Market Intelligence Group at the Portland Cement Association (PCA) has made an additional update to its Winter 2020 – 2021 economic forecast. Senior vice president and chief economist Ed Sullivan revised the association’s assessments regarding the path of Covid-19, vaccine supply, government Covid-19 relief and inflationary pressures.

The association said that it expects domestic cement consumption to grow by nearly 1% in 2021, fuelled largely by residential construction. It estimated ‘weak’ non-residential construction performance, with soft economic activity affecting government funds at federal state level. It added that the new federal government Covid-19 relief targeting state government would likely limit public cement’s drag on 2021 cement consumption growth.

Kazakhstan: Denmark-based FLSmidth has announced the opening of its new ‘Service Supercenter’ in Karagandy, Qaraghandy region. The service centre has a focus on mining, but will also serve cement customers with equipment delivery, component maintenance and rapid on-site service backed by local support. The centre consists of a 2500m² warehouse and 1200m² workshop, as well as a customer service office, customer training centre and other support facilities.

Mining president Mikko Keto said, “The main concept of the Supercenter is to get closer to our mining and cement customers across Kazakhstan and Central Asia and support them with the best solutions, fast access to spare and wear parts, and, of course, local knowhow and expertise. This move supports FLSmidth’s ever-growing focus on customer service and aftermarket.”

US: Kespry says that Cemex USA is using its drone and software product for stockpile management at its operations. A Cemex representative said that it has mapped 74,500ha of land over more than 4000 drone missions using Kespry’s product. The supplier uses autonomous aerial drones to gather survey data and then uses machine learning techniques to analyse the results.

Director of aggregate resources Matt Lewis said, “Kespry plays a critical role at both our cement and aggregates sites, despite operations being significantly different. Since initially adopting Kespry, we have been able to measure 21,100 stockpiles across our aggregates sites, while also collecting massive amounts of topographic data into the Kespry Cloud across our cement sites. The amount of time and money the Kespry platform has saved us is unmatched, and we wouldn’t be able to operate at this level if it weren’t for Kespry.”

Switzerland: Sika has developed ReCO2ver, a process which produces limestone, sand and gravel from the combination of concrete and CO₂ with an additive developed by the supplier. The process enables demolition companies to completely recycle used concrete, while storing captured CO₂ at a rate of 60kg/t of crushed concrete. The materials produced can be used as aggregates to make concrete of comparable strength to an all-new product.

Chief executive officer Paul Schuler said, "The five largest European Union countries alone generate roughly 300Mt/yr of old concrete. With complete recycling of these materials, up to 15Mt/yr of CO₂ emissions can be stored. We are convinced that our new process has the potential to benefit both our customers and the environment."