Cement News tagged: International
Ghacem to commission new mill by year-end, Ghana
Ghana’s leading cement producer Ghacem is to commission an additional 1Mta mill this year at its Tema Factory in November this year, according to the company’s managing director Morten Gade. Speaking at the company’s 2011 Workers Performance Appraisal Awards Ceremony, Mr Gade said that last year Ghacem produced 2.55Mt of cement and, of which its Tema plant accounted for 1.3Mt and the Takado...
Southern Province Cement second-quarter profit rises, Saudi Arabia
Southern Province Cement (SPC) posted a 9.6 per cent increase in second quarter profit, Reuters reports. SPC achieved a net profit of US$69.86m during the quarter, up from US$63.6m a year earlier. Revenue rose 6.77 per cent to US$71.6m compared to US$67m in 2Q11. The company attributed the increase in profits to the start of a second line at its Tuhama plant which started commercial prod...
Assam cement producers cut prices, India
Cement producers in the northeastern Indian state of Assam have cut prices by 7-8 per cent per bag, according to reports in the Economic Times of India. The newspaper writes that manufacturers based in Assam have been criticized for not lowering prices despite enjoying subsidies under the North East Industrial and Investment Promotion Policiy (NEIIPP) 2007. Cement prices have now dropped...
Coal India threatens to cut supplies to four UltraTech Cement power plants
Coal India has threatened to cut supplies to four of UltraTech Cement’s captive power plants located in the Indian states of Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. DNA India reported that last week, Coal India wrote to 16 captive power plants, including the UltraTech facilities, threatening to break long-term linkages. These units were found to be incomplete when a meeting of the Standin...
US monthly shipments rise 17.5 per cent YoY
Total shipments of Portland and blended cement in the US and Puerto Rico for April 2012 were almost 6.7Mt, 17.5 per cent higher than shipments in April 2011, data from the US Geological Survey (USGS) shows. Shipments for the year through April were 21.9Mt, up by about 19%. The leading producing states in April were Texas, Missouri, California, Florida, and Pennsylvania, in descending order...
Cemex to increase Mexican cement prices
Cemex announced that it is to increase cement prices in Mexico by an average of six per cent per bag as of today. The company said the hike, which was announced last week, is due to rising input costs. "In order to compensate for the constant increase in rates and prices of major inputs, Cemex announced its dealers an average price increase of MXP120 /t (US$9) of grey cement, equivalent to ...
Spanish cement consumption drops 34.7% in 1H12
Cement consumption in Spain plunged 34.7 per cent YoY to 7.2Mt in the first-half of 2012, latest data from the domestic cement association Oficemen showed and the outlook for the remainder of the year is not any more promising. For the full year, Oficemen expects consumption to decline by 25% to around 15Mt, representing a 73 per cent fall of highs reached in 2007 (56Mt). The industry coul...
Iran exports climb
Iran exported 3.34Mt of cement and clinker in the first three months of the current calendar year which began on March 20, the IRNA News Agency has reported. Some 2.89Mt of cement and 449,400t of clinker were exported during the period. Iran's cement production capacity will be increased by 6.8Mt to reach 82Mt by the end of the current calendar year, Mohammad Fatemian, an official of the Indu...
PT Semen Bosowa seeks loans for expansion, Indonesia
PT Semen Bosowa is seeking a US$700m-800m loan from national and foreign banks to expand its business to 10Mta by 2015. The funds will be used to construct at least four new cement plants, Semen Bosowa CEO Erwin Aksa told Bisnis Indonesia. Investments will be made in Bayuwangi (East Java), Cilegon (Banten), Sorong (Papua) and land expansion in Maros Regency (South Sulawesi). Aksa said th...
Construction of Pokot plant delayed, Kenya
Construction of a new cement factory in Pokot, Kenya, which was set to be completed by the end of next year is experiencing delays and is now expected to take longer than expected. Kenyan newspaper, The Star, reported Rajesh Kumar Rawal of the Cemtech Sanghi Group – which is behind the 1.2Mta cement plant – as saying that the company has completed the planning stages and construction was sc...
Brazil first-half 2012 sales increase
Preliminary data for the first six months of the year, show that domestic cement sales in Brazil reached 33Mt, representing an increase of 9.3 per cent over the same period of 2011. However, sales for June 2012 were 5.3Mt, down 2.8 per cent on June 2011 figures. Cumulative sales in the rolling 12 months (July 2011-June 2012) reached 66.Mt, an increase of 8.4% over the previous period (J...
Misr Beni Suef two week gas stoppage to plant, Egypt
Misr Beni Suef Cement announced that gas supplies to its plant stopped for 15 days during the period from 16 June 2012 to 30 June 2012. The company added in a release sent to the Egyptian Stock Exchanged that, despite the stoppage, cement production was not affected because it had enough clinker stock to meet market requirements during the period.
Madras Cements boosts grinding and power generation capacity
India-based producer Madras Cements is currently in the process of increasing grinding capacity at two of its cement works while two power generation projects are set to become operational in the current quarter. The company notes in its 2011-12 annual report that is Ramasamy Raja Nagar plant is in the process of installing a roll press to increase cement grinding capacity from 210tph to 26...
Holcim inaugurates new Garadagh line, Azerbaijan
President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan has attended the official inauguration of Holcim’s new dry-process line at its Garadagh cement plant in Baku. The new 1.7Mta kiln replaces the existing wet-process production and involved an investment of EUR300m. The modernisation project will enable higher production volumes, lower fuel and energy consumption and reduce emissions from the cement ...
Dangote to be issued with Zambian mining licence, Zambia
An advisory committee set up by the Zambian government is to meet within the next two weeks and issue a mining licence to Dangote Cement of Nigeria. The delay to the issuance has resulted in delays to construction of Dangote’s 1.5Mta cement plant in Zambia’s Masaiti District on the Copperbelt. However, the Mines, Energy and Water Supply Permanent Secretary Victor Mutambo has now said the ad...
Shriram aims to raise Jayajothi Cements’ utilisation
Indian engineering company Shriram EPC, which earlier this year acquired a majority stake in Sree Jayajothi Cements, plans to raise the cement plant’s capacity utilisation to 100 per cent. In March this year, Shriram EPC was forced to buy the 70 per cent stake in its debtor Sree Jayajothi Cements which couldn't pay back its dues. Shriram's debt was converted to equity. Jayajothi Cements cu...