Concrete

Making the right choice

Published

5 years ago

December 21, 2021

admin

The cement industry has realised the importance of modular grinding techniques and grinding aids to achieve a better quality of product and to obtain high energy efficiency. We see a trend where cement manufacturers are shifting towards more advancement in vertical mill or roll press systems.

Energy consumption continues to remain the key issue associated with every industry today. In the cement industry, the grinding process accounts for significant energy consumption. Various research papers suggest that the grinding process consumes 60-70 per cent of a cement plant’s electrical demand. Hence, limiting energy consumption at the grinding process level is a major industry focus today. Another key focus area is the end-product. Cement manufacturers are exploring new ways to expand the cement additives range and cement/clinker ratio to make the final product more durable, stronger, and cost-effective. The solutions available in the market today come with versatile technologies, with low-energy consumption, as well as are easily capable of adapting to a wide range of raw materials. In short, solutions that offer low energy consumption and high flexibility are in high demand.

Trends

The three key trends in the grinding process in the cement industry are– efficiency, reduction of power consumption, and system flexibility/simplicity. In terms of demand, vertical mills have increased their share as compared to ball mills. The use of separate grinding plants is observed to have picked up drastically. IT Vendors have also increased their focus towards offering more and more technologically advanced and energy-efficient solutions for the grinding process.

Avanish Karrahe, Global Product Manager Grinding Products, Cement Industry, FLSmidth, said, “Along with mill design, advancement in high-efficiency separator design has further improved energy efficiency by reducing the amount of over-grinding, unnecessarily returning product-size material to the grinding part of the machine, allowing for more stable operation and better overall product quality.”

He further explains that when combined with the latest mill designs an optimised separator offers potential for up to 10% better overall energy efficiency than mill systems with inferior separators.

Grinding process

Many factors influence the grindability of cement/clinker. For example, clinker with a high content of small pores will be easy to grind. Other factors such as crystal size, cooling velocity, age of clinker also influence the grindability. A part of the grinding is done in a pregrinding unit, with help of roller press, vertical shaft impact crusher, and vertical roller mill.

In another scenario, the tube mill is omitted, and entire grinding work is done in roller press with desagglomerator and rotor type separator or vertical roller mill with integrated rotor type separator.

Various technical and economic aspects are taken into consideration before selecting the best grinding mechanism. Furthermore, factors such as mill feed, composition, grindability of components, grain size, moisture content of additive, mill control, manual or automatic processes, grinding aid, etc.

Explains Dr. Bibekananda Mohapatra, Director General, National Council for Cement and Building Materials, “Comparing different grinding systems, high pressure grinding rolls are at par in energy efficiency as compared to VRMs for grinding purpose. In VRMs, recent development in slave rollers is also providing grinding force enabling high energy efficiency. Advancements in VRM main drive gearbox is leading to lower cooling requirement and reduction in energy loss.”

Ball Mills: Ball mill systems are not the preferred option for any new projects. However, a few companies prefer starting with ball mills with minimum investment, and later when they expand the business, they adopt roller press or vertical mill for pre-grinding of clinker.

Vertical roller mill systems (VRM): These are the most versatile equipment, which can handle all the types of raw materials, solid fuels, and additives used in the cement process.

Karrahe says that roller presses and vertical roller mills have much higher grinding efficiencies compared to traditional ball mills and can operate with almost half the electrical energy consumption compared to a traditional ball mill.

Roller press systems: Over the last few decades, with the developments of technology and material sciences, roller press technology has now evolved as one of the most energy-efficient grinding systems for raw meal and cement grinding, completely eliminating the ball mills in grinding circuits.

Modular grinding v/s conventional

Traditional method: Grinding of clinker from the kiln is the final manufacturing stage at a cement plant. The griding process includes 4-5 percent gypsum and grinding aids (additives), into the final product, cement.

The cement grinding process accounts for approximately 40-50 percent of the energy consumption. It is noteworthy that the quality of the final cement is extremely dependent on the operation/grinding mode. The cement quality and the consumption of electrical energy are dependent on the grinding procedure. Thus, the cement grinding plant must be adequately designed and operated.

Modular grinding: This system is a portable solution for companies that need of quick start of production or need to increase production capacity on short notice to meet the peak market demands. Today, many vendors offer modular grinding mechanisms that offer quick installation setup, enhanced product performance, and low energy consumption. They are designed in such a way that it suits a wide range of raw material types and finish products’ variety (recipe, fineness, etc).

The advantages of the modular design are:

Proven technology of major equipment
Low cost of transportation of equipment to site
Low delivery times of equipment
Low investment risk and fast market entry
Low construction and Installation periods
Compact design with minimum land usage

Automation in grinding process

Today, a lot of many equipment companies have come up with automation solutions allowing the grinding process to be fully automated. They offer dynamic systems, which are more accurate to control than a conventional ball mill. Fully automated systems allow easy management of raw material quality variations and are very smooth and safe to operate. Moreover, automation in grinding also eliminates the high responsibility of daily operations, thus allowing resources to focus on more valuable tasks.

During the pandemic, remote services have picked up fast, offering daily operations, predictive maintenance, and troubleshooting services. This kind of development has shown its relevance during the pandemic.

In the past decade, the cement industry has realised the importance of process control in grinding circuits to achieve a better quality of product, and to obtain high energy efficiency. The PLC-based automation system is so common even in mill systems of capacities as low as 30 tph.

Karrahe said “The use of digital technology such as advanced process control can further improve energy efficiency by as much as 5 percent. References of combining separator upgrades to modern high-efficiency design or upsizing to accommodate new feed materials and/or product types with advanced process control have yielded as much as 25 percent overall performance improvement.”

“Reduction in mills pressure drop, optimisation of grinding media in ball mills, separator fan volume loading, the addition of grinding aids are some of the optimisation measures adopted by cement plants as seen in recent PAT cycles. Some high-energy efficient plants have already achieved overall specific electrical energy consumption of 63-65 kWh/t cement. It is anticipated that with the improvements in motor efficiencies, fan efficiencies, implementation of above-mentioned technologies and innovations, there is a scope for further electrical energy savings in grinding section,” explains Dr. Mohapatra.

Grinding aids

Cement clinker is difficult to grind, and the fine grinding of this material is one of the major problems of the cement industry. Cement clinker is difficult to grind, and the fine grinding of this material is one of the major problems of the cement industry. One method is to use special breakage machines, but it is usually more expensive as it requires more energy and reduces capacity. The most economic and the best alternative is to use a grinding aid or additives to obtain the best product.

Grinding aid or grinding additives are substances which when mixed into the grinding mill contents lead to an increase in the rate of size reduction and flowability. These additives are added into the material in a certain ratio based on the weight and the grinding machine for a definite time at the same condition. Different types of grinding additives are suitable for clinker grinding, which results in an improvement in the grindability by decreasing agglomeration and increasing breakage.

The use of grinding aid is a common practice in cement manufacturing for bringing improvements in mill capacity and overall better operations. For example, grinding aid stabilises the grinding bed in a VRM. This reduces the vibration level, for more capacity at the same power use. Since grinding aids offer better stability, it reduces the requirement of stopping and starting the mills, which further decreases the total energy consumption.

Conclusion

Globally, cement producers are fighting climate change challenges and the focus is more toward attaining sustainability in each step of cement manufacturing. Suppliers are well aware of this challenge and are coming up with innovative ideas to develop flexible solutions with high levels of energy efficiency, emission control, and product quality. Such kind of evolution will help the cement industry reduce the use of natural resources, make use of recycled materials and preserve energy consumption.

In terms of choosing the grinding system, though ball mill systems are still preferred due to less CAPEX, we see a shift in the industry towards vertical mill or roll press systems.

Concrete

Shree Cement Expands Bangur Concrete Network with Patna Plant

New facility takes the company’s national RMC network to 36 plants

Published

2 days ago

November 9, 2026

admin

Shree Cement has inaugurated a 60 m³/hour ready-mix concrete plant in Patna, Bihar, under its Bangur Concrete brand. The facility takes the company’s ready-mix concrete (RMC) network to 36 plants across India and strengthens its presence in eastern markets.

The plant was inaugurated by Neeraj Akhoury, managing director of Shree Cement, in the presence of senior company officials and other guests. It has been established to serve demand for ready-mix concrete in Patna and neighbouring areas, where infrastructure development, urban expansion and real estate activity are supporting construction growth.

The facility is designed to supply construction projects across Patna and surrounding markets. Its installed capacity of 60 m³/hour will enable Bangur Concrete to serve customers across the region while improving distribution and supply capabilities in eastern India.

The expansion is intended to improve customer service, strengthen the company’s market presence and support development activity in Bihar. The plant incorporates modern batching technology, material handling systems and quality control processes aimed at maintaining consistency in production and improving operational efficiency.

With the addition of the Patna facility, Bangur Concrete now operates 36 RMC plants across India. The business is expanding its footprint in key construction markets to improve customer access to ready-mix concrete, which is increasingly used in infrastructure, commercial and residential projects because it supports controlled production, consistent quality and more efficient material management at construction sites.

The facility will also follow environmentally responsible operating practices, in line with Shree Cement’s focus on sustainable construction solutions. The latest addition adds capacity to the company’s RMC operations and supports its efforts to serve regional construction markets as development activity continues across Bihar.

Concrete

Ambuja Plans 2.9 MTPA Godda Cement Unit

Proposed unit forms part of Ambuja Cements’ Rs. 145 bn expansion

Published

2 days ago

November 9, 2026

admin

Ambuja Cements has proposed a 2.9 mn tonnes per annum (MTPA) cement grinding unit in Godda district, Jharkhand, as part of a Rs. 145 bn expansion programme. The plan is intended to lift the company’s overall cement capacity to 155 MTPA by financial year 2029-30 (FY30), from its current 113.5 MTPA.

The proposal forms part of the Adani Group company’s wider manufacturing expansion across eastern and northeastern India, according to a company statement issued on Monday. The Godda unit would add grinding capacity to Ambuja Cements’ network and is intended to help serve demand in Jharkhand and neighbouring states.

Locating production closer to these markets is expected to reduce transportation costs and delivery times, while the project could support employment in plant operations, maintenance, logistics and administration. The company also linked the facility to indirect activity in transportation, contract services, construction, warehousing and local supply chains.

The expansion plan includes a 2.9 MTPA grinding unit each in Assam and Bihar, as well as additional clinker capacity in Assam. Together, the projects are designed to distribute manufacturing capacity more widely and improve the connection between clinker production and grinding operations, Ambuja Cements’ cement-business chief executive Vinod Bahety said.

Clinker is the intermediate material produced before it is ground and blended to make cement, making the Godda proposal part of a broader materials and logistics network rather than an isolated facility. Ambuja Cements has not provided a commissioning timeline, a Godda-specific investment breakdown, land details or a detailed employment estimate in the supplied announcement.

The project’s impact will depend on implementation of the plant, associated transport links and local supply chains. The announcement sets out the capacity objective but does not specify the project’s construction schedule or operational start date.

Concrete

Beyond Automation: Building AI-driven Cement Plants

Published

2 days ago

November 9, 2026

admin

Prerak Manisha Shah, Founder and CTO, Cogniify.ai, draws a sharp distinction between automation and self-optimisation, and the need for a workforce that understands both the capabilities and the limits of the intelligence they are working with.

The cement production process uses a lot of energy, involving various steps such as processing of raw materials, use of kilns and running machinery. There are numerous factors that should be kept in balance in order to make the process effective. It is possible to save production costs, quality and environment performance. In spite of the fact that traditional automation has allowed to achieve consistency in working and reduce the level of human interference, it is not always possible to monitor changing conditions and solve issues in advance.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the latest approach that has transformed cement production. By analysing up-to-date data and supporting companies in search for the correct solution, it is possible to turn the production process into one of continuous optimisation and advancements.

Difference between automation and self-optimisation
Automation and self-optimisation may seem synonymous, but they play different roles. Automated systems obey predefined rules. For instance, a conveyor belt comes to a halt when a sensor senses something blocking it; kilns will have their fuel input adjusted by temperature regulators when the temperature readings go out of range. Self-optimisation takes it a step further. The system is capable of obtaining historical data, as well as current operational data, and then using it to understand what is going on in the plant and how to improve operational efficiency.
Thus, instead of sticking to a certain temperature, an AI-based system evaluates how the composition of raw materials, fuel properties, feed rates, and air distribution can influence kiln performance. It also creates recommendations about what to change in order to ensure the quality of clinker with minimum fuel costs. With a proper set of controls and safety features, some adjustments can be performed automatically.
The distinction is significant: automation is about executing commands, while self-optimisation is connected to making better decisions based on available data. In any case, human supervision is required, particularly with regard to the decisions that could affect safety, product quality and stability of operations.

Turning the kiln into an intelligent, predictive system
The rotary kiln is the main equipment in the cement manufacturing process. It is important to keep the kiln operating appropriately to get the desired quality of clinker, which is an intermediate material for cement production. That said, the kiln’s performance depends on many factors that are extensively interconnected. Any change in one of them would influence the rest. Traditionally, the operators would make use of their experience and laboratory results combined with information from the control room, reacting to those changes.
Nevertheless, AI can assist them in the process of handling changes that occur within the operating kiln. For example, predictive models would estimate what will happen if raw material composition or fuel quality is changed. It would give the operators a chance to optimise the operational conditions beforehand. AI can also help to discover unstable conditions within the kiln, which would suggest forthcoming problems. It is also worth mentioning, however, that these advantages depend widely on the accuracy of data received from sensors used in the production premises as well as the availability of models and their connection with the process.

Predictive maintenance
When unexpected breakdowns happen in manufacturing, it can produce a vast amount of disruption in manufacturing. For example, equipment such as kiln drives, gearboxes, fans, and conveyors can lead to decreased production without counting the increased expense in repairs and altered time of deliveries. Traditional preventive maintenance reduces the chances of errors because it helps plan inspections and maintenance of the machines, but in certain cases it appears unnecessary.
With predictive maintenance, AI programmes use data about vibration, temperature of bearings, electric current of the motor and operating time of the equipment in order to determine when the machine is likely to break. For instance, decisions about making preventive maintenance of the gearbox in your cement mill may be made only with the help of the changing pattern of vibrations. The moment the AI recognises that the vibration of the machine has changed, the engineers will be able to check the machine before it breaks down. In that way, the engineers would be able to examine its parts and bring them to ordering spare parts and plan maintenance works.

Energy optimisation
In cement production, energy is one of the highest operational costs since kilns require a lot of thermal energy while raw mills, cement mills, fans, and other equipment need a lot of energy. Thus, increased efficiency has a direct influence on the operational costs and emissions when it comes to cement manufacturing. Since machines operate in different conditions, AI could help improve productivity through energy use optimisation based on how parameters and working conditions affect fuel and electricity consumption.
AI can help determine optimal parameters such as kiln charge, combustion, mill charge, airflow, and equipment operation to find all the possibilities for maximising the efficiency of the process. AI can help distinguish conditions that include high specific energy consumption so that the operators can adapt their processes without risking the quality of their products. An important contribution of AI includes the development of algorithms that optimise processes, taking into account the need to minimise fuel costs, production, and the quality of clinker. Applying AI technology allows automating processes where one would be unable to optimise energy consumption properly. This helps to reduce costs related to a plant’s operation without making high-level changes in
its operation.

Making sustainability a real-time operational goal
In the concrete industry, sustainability creates a strong connection to efficiency in performance and operations. The process of making concrete involves a combustion process as well as the process of converting limestone into cement, which generates emissions of carbon dioxide. The electricity that is consumed and the fuel types that are used also contribute to overall emissions of the plant. Analytics involved with AI technologies can contribute to the reduction of emissions by enabling continuous monitoring of processes associated with fuel and energy use. Analytics allows assessing the emitters in real time based on data related to the fuel burnt, heating processes, and emissions, as well as deviations from the norm that have occurred. AI gives the chance to evaluate these deviations and take actions in order to keep stable conditions in the kiln. It also provides businesses with chances to optimize the level of air used and make processing much more efficient.
When good measurement methods are used, AI can provide actual monitoring of emissions intensity. However, the application of AI technologies alone will not help eliminate the emissions connected with limestone chemistry.

Connecting the entire plant through a digital twin
Cement manufacturing entails various activities that are interrelated to each other. A modification in raw mill will have an impact on kiln feeding and also the performance of the kiln in turn will influence the quality of clinker produced and demand for energy that is needed for grinding cement. If every machine is optimised independently, it may lead to the loss of chances to improve overall efficiency of the cement production. A digital twin is an outstanding technology that allows overcoming this problem.
A digital twin is a technology that allows creating a representation of concrete equipment or process based on the data received from equipment or process operation. Depending on the characteristics, it can allow simulation of work conditions and test
various decisions. When combined with AI, this technology can test various scenarios and make coordinated decisions by departments. In particular, engineers can evaluate various potential improvements before real implementation. A digital twin is not equal to a complete copy of a physical plant or equipment.

From data collection to decisions
The optimisation of AI technology needs a good digital foundation that aggregates valid data from sensors, labs, maintenance history, meters, and production software. Otherwise, isolated systems make it hard to combine important pieces of information. For example, while the maintenance department knows about continuous malfunctions with a fan, at the same time, the production group has information about changing operational conditions. Thus, it would be impossible to understand what a specific piece of data means. A good digital foundation incorporates good definitions of data used, proper communication between systems followed by a good data storage process, and clear identification of the one who owns this particular data. Furthermore, cybersecurity, access control, and protection of crucial technologies must be given serious consideration.
Data quality is very important, as wrong data from sensors, missing values or misnamed historical records can result in misleading outputs from AI. Therefore, factories must develop technology to ensure correct data, monitor the quality of models used and train them with respect to changes in devices or operational conditions. The goal is to turn collected data into useful suggestions for action.

The human factor
The change to self-optimising actions is not just a technology-related task; it’s also a change in how people do their business. Workers, maintenance specialists, and professionals have field knowledge that can’t be replaced by AI technology. Teams should be able to trust recommendations provided by AI or other systems, which means understanding the suggestions, the reasons behind those suggestions, and expectations in regard to the effects of the offer.
An algorithm that generates alerts without explanations or makes absurd recommendations will have difficulty becoming a part of daily operations. Therefore, the cement industry has to make sure that staff is involved in the identification of issues where AI can be used, as well as in testing and outcome evaluation processes. Training should educate personnel to interpret AI results, understand limitations, and know when to stop AI recommendations.
The establishment of limitations for automated operations is of utmost importance, as well as making sure that there are procedures created to react to sensor malfunctions, communication loss, or abnormal behaviour of the model. All that needs to be done for employees to perceive AI as an assistant improving their experience and expertise.
The future of cement production relies on transitioning from being an isolated automated industry to a connected, data-led and more self-optimising. The application of artificial intelligence permits the plants to predict equipment failure, improve stability of kilns, reduce energy use and put a higher focus on sustainability. Digital twins and data integration enable the producers to understand the influence of adjustments that come at different stages throughout the production process as far as the entire production line is concerned.
At the same time, technology cannot achieve results by itself. The success of the plant relies on the use of accurate data; verified models, information security measures, efficient process management and knowledgeable personnel. Moreover, it should be taken into account that cement plants do not need to shop today, as the result has to be reached stage by stage.

About the author:
Prerak Manisha Shah, Founder and CTO, Cogniify.ai, is an AI and data engineering expert with experience at Meta and Harvard Medical School. He specialises in machine learning, predictive analytics and enterprise AI, applying data-driven solutions to improve operational efficiency and business outcomes.