Displaying items by tag: Germany

Germany: Cemex has acquired a majority stake in the Berlin-based recycling company RC-Baustoffe to enhance its circularity business Regenera. The company processes construction, demolition and excavation materials. The acquisition integrates RC-Baustoffe with Regenera, allowing the facility to process up to 400,000t/yr, which will be turned into repurposed aggregates for concrete production.

CEO of Cemex, Fernando González, said “With acquisitions such as this, Cemex continues to strengthen its commitment to circularity through Regenera as well as promoting the world’s transition to a more circular economy. Construction and demolition materials account for more than 30% of global ‘waste’ streams and reintegrating these materials into the construction value chain can reduce the use of virgin raw materials."

Finland/Germany: Heidelberg Materials and Metsä Wood have launched a concrete-based wall element designed to replace conventional walls in construction. The product is comprised of insulation and laminated veneer lumber, sandwiched between two layers of reduced-CO2 concrete. The Cool Down News has reported that the element has 30 – 50% lower CO₂ emissions than conventional concrete walls, according to its developers. It also reduces the total weight of the wall by 60%.

Metsä Wood business development manager Håkan Arnebrant said "One of the advantages of this hybrid element is that builders do not have to change their way of building with concrete elements, but can still lower their emissions. At the same time, the walls can be made 50 – 75mm thinner than walls built with concrete elements, which can give quite a few extra square meters in a building."

Germany/US: Concrete production equipment supplier TopWerk Group has formally endorsed Partanna Global's carbon-negative binder as a replacement for cement in the production of concrete using its equipment. Partanna plans to install TopWerk equipment at its four upcoming production plants, under an exclusive three-year agreement. The endorsement is intended to help shift TopWerk's global customers from using cement to using Partanna Global’s binder.

Partanna Global CEO Rick Fox said “TopWerk's endorsement of Partanna represents a major vote of confidence in our technology from one of the most respected names in global construction. We’re humbled and proud that one of the world’s leading concrete machinery producers has given us their backing. We hope this signals to the industry that Portland cement is no longer the only solution in town, and that the days of burning rocks are fast coming to an end.”

TopWerk CEO Robert Gruss said "We believe our exclusive partner Partanna has come up with a truly impressive solution that can contribute to putting this polluting practice to an end. The company’s carbon negative binder is one of the most exciting innovations we have witnessed in our industry for decades. It is the most advanced alternative binder solution in the market and the only credibly carbon negative solution that has the potential to scale globally. Over the last two years, we have rigorously tested their formula and have validated its application as a direct replacement solution for Portland cement. In many ways, their binder actually performs better than the legacy solution.”

The endorsement follows Saudi Arabia-based property developer ROSHN's announcement of an upcoming carbon-negative concrete plant that will use Partanna Global's technology earlier in January 2024.

Germany: An activist or activists have claimed responsibility for starting a fire that engulfed five trucks, multiple cement silos and part of a building at a Cemex Deutschland ready-mix concrete batching plant in Kreuzberg, Berlin, Zeit Online News has reported.

In a statement posted on news website Indymedia DE, the purported culprit(s) claimed that they targeted the plant for its involvement in supplying concrete for the A100 road expansion project in Berlin. Additionally, the statement alleged that Cemex has supplied concrete for illegal Israeli military checkpoints in Palestine, for which reason the self-proclaimed arsonists chose to target the group’s German subsidiary.

Germany: Cemex Zement has bought two iONTRON eMixer electric ready-mix concrete mixer trucks from Putzmeister Group. The ready-mix concrete producer will deploy the vehicles in its Berlin operations, with one based at its Hohenschönhausen batching plant and the other at its Spandau batching plant. The vehicles offer a full eight-hour workday from a single overnight charge. When recharged using renewable energy, they can reduce journey’s CO₂ emissions by 100%. They will also contribute to a reduction in urban air pollution and noise along the routes on which they operate.

Cemex Zement’s director materials Marcel Busch said "We are reducing emissions throughout our value chain, and transport plays an important role in this.” He added “We are investing in the electrification of our vehicle fleet at our sites throughout Germany."

Denmark/Germany: US-based Master Builders Solutions has won a contract to supply admixtures for use in the Fehmarnbelt Tunnel project. The project will build a 17.6km immersed tunnel between the islands of Fehmarn in Germany and Lolland in Denmark. It will directly connect Germany via a double-track railway and four-lane motorway to eastern Denmark and the Scandinavian Peninsula beyond. This will reduce rail travel time between Hamburg in Germany and Copenhagen in Denmark by 35% to 3 hours 15 minutes. The tunnel will consist of 79 standard 217m-long precast elements, and a further ten 85.7m-long service elements. The latter include a subfloor sections in addition to the tunnel's four tubes. Master Builders Solutions says that it will supply 11,000t of admixture to produce a total 3Mm3 of concrete required for the project. The supplier said that its admixtures will help concrete to meet specifications in line with the Fehmarnbelt Tunnel's projected 120-year lifespan. Master Builders Solutions has collaborated with contractor FLC to develop a new MasterEase superplasticiser for use in the project.

Master Builders Solutions Denmark technical manager Jens Qvist said "This has been an incredibly exciting process, requiring very close collaboration with both our own European colleagues and FLC’s Danish and international concrete experts."

Germany: Mexico-based Cemex says that Sweden-based Volvo Trucks has supplied it with the world’s first fully electric and zero-emission heavy concrete mixer truck at a joint event in Berlin. The Volvo FMX electric truck can be used a full day’s work with a single top-up charge. It will start operating at the Berlin Spandau ready-mix concrete plant in Berlin in February 2023. The two companies signed a deal in 2021 to work together on electromobility solutions on mobile construction equipment and trucks, productivity solutions and uptime services.

Cemex’s chief executive officer Fernando A González said “Our partnership with Volvo has tremendous potential to contribute to the decarbonisation of our business. Rolling out our first fully electric ready-mix truck is a strong progress in that direction.”

Cemex and Volvo Group are founding members of the First Movers Coalition, a collaboration between the World Economic Forum and US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, for companies to make purchasing commitments that create market demand for low-carbon technologies.

Volvo Trucks’ portfolio of electric trucks ranges from 16 – 44t and covers a range of applications from city distribution, refuse handling, urban construction transports to regional haulage. Volvo Trucks is a market leader in heavy electric trucks in Europe and the US. The company’s target is that half of its total truck sales will be electric by 2030.

Germany: Cemex Zement has unveiled a fully electric zero-emissions concrete mixer truck, the first in the industry. Sweden-based Volvo supplied the truck, an FMX model.

Mexico-based Cemex said that it is working to discover, pilot and scale technologies for emissions-free transport in the construction industry through its partnership with Volvo.

Spain: Holcim has introduced its EcoPact Prime concrete and mortar range, following a strong reception in other European markets, including Switzerland, Germany and France. The EcoPact Prime range is presented as a sustainable portfolio of concrete and mortar products offering a 70% reduction in CO₂ compared to equivalents based on ordinary Portland cement (OPC).

Manuel Barrero, director of the concrete activity at LafargeHolcim Spain, said “Decarbonisation is a fundamental pillar of our business strategy. Therefore, in our objective to develop materials and solutions that allow us to build better with less, we are going one step further by introducing this new product to the Spanish market.”

All the products in the EcoPact Prime range have their own Environmental Product Declarations (EPD). They incorporate low-emission cements, also from the EcoPlanet range, selected aggregates, additions, water, special additives and use electrical energy generated from renewable sources in their manufacture.

The products are intended for the construction of all structural elements, including beams, walls, floors, foundations or pillars, as well as self-compacting structures, those that need to drain and those that need to exhibit particular aesthetic qualities.

Germany: Ireland-based CRH has agreed to sell its subsidiaries Opterra Zement and Opterra Beton to Thomas Gruppe. Thomas Gruppe expects to complete its acquisition of the businesses later in 2022. Opterra Zement owns the 1.4Mt/yr Karsdorf, Saxony-Anhalt, cement plant and 0.5Mt/yr Sötenich, North Rhine-Westphalia, grinding plant, the latter of which is closed. Opterra Beton operates the Neufahrn, Bavaria, ready-mix concrete batching plant.

Thomas Gruppe said "For years, we have been pursuing a steady and long-term growth course in the field of cement and precast and ready-mix concrete. In the cement segment, our competitive position improved significantly with the purchase of the Erwitte (North Rhine-Westphalia) plant in 2017. Together with the grinding plant in Dorndorf (Thuringia), we have achieved a significantly larger area coverage in Germany, and also in the Netherlands, and benefit from synergy effects." It continued "We would like to continue on this growth course. An opportunity like the one to take over the cement plant in Karsdorf does not come often. The Karsdorf plant, with its gigantic limestone deposits, its market position of well over 1Mt/yr of cement and its experienced team, enables us better to supply our customers, and to leverage improvement potential. In addition, Karsdorf is of sufficient size for us to implement CO₂ separation technology in its production of clinker for the Dorndorf grinding plant." Thomas Gruppe concluded "We are convinced that cement will become a clean building material and believe in its future."