UK: Hanson supplied its Regen ground granulated blastfurnace slag (GGBS) product for use on part of the Thames Tideway Tunnel super sewer project in Wapping, London. The product was used to overcome difficult ground conditions. Around 5700t tonnes of Regen, supplied from its Purfleet grinding plant in Essex, was used with 3000t of Ketton cement to create a binder to stabilise soil so work to construct a combined sewer overflow could progress and provide a connection to the main east tunnel.

Costain, VINCI Construction Grands Projects and Bachy Soletanche worked with Hanson in laboratory trials to test the performance of the system and suitability of the selected mix design. Deep soil mixing, a technique that enhances the characteristics of weak soils by combining them with a cementitious binder, was chosen as the final stabilisation method.

The Thames Tideway sewer network expansion is due for completion in 2024 and is happening across 24 construction sites in London, spanning from Acton in West London to Beckton in the east of the city.

Belgium: The World Steel Association (WSA) has published data that shows a 3.4% year-on-year increase in global steel production to 1870Mt in 2019 from 1810Mt in 2018. The figure belies a general decline in production in most regions: excluding China, total production fell by 1.6% year-on-year to 874Mt from 888Mt in 2018. China’s growth was 8.3%, to 996Mt from 920Mt, corresponding to an increase in its share of global production to 53% from 51%. Growth in the Middle East outstripped this at 19% year-on-year, increasing to 45.3Mt in 2019 from 38.0Mt one year previously. The Middle East now controls 2.4% of global steel production, compared to 2.1% in 2018. India and the US also experienced production growths of 1.8% and 1.5% respectively. The WSA expects the steel industry’s performance to have a staying effect on granulated blast furnace slag (GBFS) prices for cement producers in these regions.

Russia: Sibirsky Cement Holding (Sibtsem) subsidiary Topkinsky Cement has announced that it has entered commercial production of a new Mita slag Portland cement with granulated blast furnace slag (GBFS) at its 2.7Mt/yr integrated plant in Topki, for which it received a certification of conformity with ‘cement for general construction’ standards on 16 January 2020. Nina Poputnikova, Topkinsky Cement laboratory and quality department head, said that it is producing the cement in response to ‘construction companies’ increased interest in cement for use in reinforced, precast concrete in monolithic structures such as buried and hydraulic structures.’

“In the near future we plan to certify two new cements,” said Topkinsky Cement managing director Alexey Ospelnikov. One will be a low-heat general-purpose cement for large-sized concrete structures and the other a sulphate-resistant Portland cement. “Expanding the assortment will help strengthen the company’s position in the Russian cement market.”

India: Gebr. Pfeiffer has announced that it has received an order for one MVR 6000 C-6 roller mill for Chettinand Cement Corp. Pvt. Ltd.’s upcoming 2.0Mt/yr Vishakapatnam granulated blast-furnace slag (GBFS) and slag cement
Grinding plant in Andhra Pradesh. Gebr. Pfeiffer said the mill will grind slag and cement to a fineness of between 3000 and 3800 blaine at a rate of between 235t/hr and 340t/hr. It says the mill improves plant availability by the active redundancy of the grinding rollers, enabling mill operation with reduced rollers in the event of maintenance work or a malfunction.