PT Semen Bosowa Maros officially started construction on a new clinker plant in South Sulawesi as part of its expansion programme. Located in Maros, Kiln Plant Line 2 will increase production capacity to from 2.5Mta to 5.2Mta.

Construction of the US$130m works is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2014.

The new unit is expected to help the company increase its cement production to meet the country’s growing cement demand. “As of now, our cement production is 3.2Mta, only about 6% of the national demand,” Bosowa Corporation chief executive officer Erwin Aksa said. He added that the group is expected to have production capacity of around 10Mt of cement in 2015, enabling the cement producer to meet around a fifth of national demand, estimated at about 53Mt.

Semen Bosowa Maros is also developing new grinding plants in Banyuwangi in East Java, Cilegon in Banten, Sorong in West Pa-pua and Amurang in North Sulawesi.

The Banyuwangi grinding plant will have a production capacity of 1.8Mta with investment reaching IDR1tn (US$103m), is scheduled to be ready for operations before the end of 2013. The company will spend a further IDR1tn on its Cilegon grinding unit, which will add a 1.8Mta to production capacity in 2014. The Sorong and Amurang grinding units, each with a 0.7Mta capacity, will also see individual investments of IDR0.5tn.