Cement News tagged under: manufacturing technology
Novel no-cement refractories03 October 2019, Published under Cement NewsFor the areas in cement plants impacted by high wear or corrosion, refractory specialists have developed new no-cement refractory materials based on electrochemical bonding. A 25 per cent silicon carbide material has been successfully installed in a cement kiln riser duct and is reported to be performing well to date, more than one year after its installation. By James Hemrick, Gary Bader, Gary Hoyson and Elmer Reno, Reno Refractories Inc, USA Figure 1: example of microstructures for ... |
Efficient grinding meets reduced CO2 emissions12 August 2019, Published under Cement NewsWhile cement plants have made sound progress in terms of reducing CO 2 emissions from fuel consumption, progress relating to such emissions from electricity consumption has been slower. VDZ looks at a key power consumer in the modern cement plant: the grinding section. By Jonas Knappert, Kevin Treiber and Stefan Seemann, VDZ, Germany. Figure 1: electrical energy consumption of the cement manufacturing processes 1 Cement production is energy intensive in terms of fuel and elect... |
External circulation technology for VRM raw meal grinding04 July 2019, Published under Cement NewsThe pressure differential of a traditional vertical roller mill (VRM) system for raw meal grinding is high, with the fan accounting for about 45 per cent of power consumption. Sinoma International Engineering has developed external circulation VRM technology for raw meal grinding, whereby materials are transported by elevator instead of gas flow, leading to reductions in pressure differential and power consumption. By Du Xin, Nie Wenhai and Chai Xingteng, Sinoma International Engineering Co,... |
Countdown for Bardon27 June 2019, Published under Cement NewsAs part of LafargeHolcim’s Capital Markets Day in 2018, guests enjoyed a site visit to Europe’s largest aggregates quarry at Bardon Hill, east of Coalville, Leicestershire, UK. Owned by LafargeHolcim subsidiary Aggregate Industries, the recently-extended quarry will formally open in June 2019 when the refurbished primary crusher goes on-stream. Aggregate Industries’ Bardon Hill quarry, UK, supplies 1.5Mta of aggregates, 2.1Mta of concrete products and 7.5Mta of asphalt. Image sourc... |
The digital quarry10 June 2019, Published under Cement NewsQuarries often give the impression that they have been forgotten in capital investment projects, having bypassed technological changes for several years. However, the quarry is where production starts and here, modern technology can provide savings downstream, in the kiln line. By Dr Pawel Kawalec, Kawalec Consulting GmbH, Switzerland. No longer an innovation, the use of drones is becoming more commonplace Rising environmental awareness as well as stricter local development rule... |
Processing depth for AFs06 June 2019, Published under Cement NewsIn his paper ‘A new approach to burning alternative fuels’, delivered at the Cemtech Europe 2018 conference in Istanbul, Turkey, Oral Turesay of KHD Humboldt Wedag introduced the concept of ‘processing depth’. His thesis was that the greater the proportion of the thermal energy requirements to be provided by alternative fuels (AFs), the greater the investments for kiln modification are likely to be. That is certainly the case and has been borne out by many examples from the international cem... |
Portland cement, lime and alkali-activated binders15 May 2019, Published under Cement NewsFollowing on from last month’s discussion regarding the production of alternatives to Portland cement clinker, Arthur Harrisson takes a closer look at alkali-activated binders. Fly ash needs to be activated to produce an effective binder In a recent article 1 about the production of alternatives to Portland cement clinker, in the discussion of the preferred options of Gartner and Sui 2 , mention was made of alkali-activated binders, which were considered worthy of a paper of th... |
A cooler for the future29 April 2019, Published under Cement NewsTo reduce frequent clinker cooler downtime and high clinker temperatures a US cement plant required a new cooler to be installed. As an additional benefit future upgrades would also be easier to carry out. By IKN, Germany. Figure 1: this US cement plant had a new cooler installed by IKN to maximise performance A cement plant in the USA (see Figure 1) was experiencing frequent clinker cooler downtime and high clinker temperatures, which were causing production issues. In addition... |
Digital twins24 April 2019, Published under Cement NewsEstablished for some time in industries such as automotive, logistics and even healthcare, digital twins are becoming more widespread. For the cement industry digital twins can also provide benefits as they enable accurate and faster prediction of changes in specific process conditions. By Matthias Mersmann, aixergee GmbH, Germany. Figure 1: digital twin of a turbine in a power plant Digital twins have become well known in many applications over recent years. The elegance of thi... |
Belite appearance in clinkers11 April 2019, Published under Cement NewsThis month Arthur Harrisson looks at the second-most abundant constituent of cement – belite – and its appearance in clinkers. Figure 1: Type I belite with multiple sets of parallel laminations. The blue crystals are alite Of the four main constituents of cement clinker, the tricalcium silicate known as alite is the most abundant and is the one that is conventionally maximised to react with water to produce calcium silicate hydrate, the material required to achieve strength in a... |