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Month: November 2017

NPCA opens Sustainability Awards call for entries

Concrete News

Source: National Precast Concrete Association, Carmel, Ind.

NPCA is accepting 2018 Sustainability Awards submissions in two producer and two associate member categories, respectively: Best Project and Best Company/Plant; Best Product and Best Company/Plant. Each category will have one winner; other approved entries will receive honorable mention. Graphics profiling all approved entries will be prominently displayed at The Precast Show 2018, February 22-24 in Denver, and featured at www.precast.org and in upcoming NPCA periodicals.

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Coal ash recycling at record rate despite lower concrete market consumption

Concrete News

Sources: American Coal Ash Association, Farmington Hills, Mich.; CP staff

The American Coal Ash Association’s just-released “Production and Use Survey” pegs 2016 Class F and Class C fly ash consumption in concrete at 14.4 million tons, down 8 percent from the prior year’s record 15.7 million tons. ACAA attributes the dip to regional supply shortages that resulted from power plant shutdowns and generating stations’ changing fuel profiles. Demand for fly ash remained strong across all concrete markets last year, the group affirms, and utilization likely would have been higher absent logistical disruptions.

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Command Alkon tracks ‘Domino’s’ effect on customer expectations

Concrete News

Sources: CP staff; Command Alkon, Birmingham, Ala.

In a sign of rapidly changing times for information technology and heavy building materials, Command Alkon departed from past annual customer conference agendas at ELEVATE 2017. Attendees of the early-November gathering were compelled to grasp the a) parallels between their business-to-business operations and two business-to-consumer service and product brands; and, b) role of analytics and Big Data in anticipating construction market conditions driving profitability and growth.

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ASTM Road and Paving committee releases expansion joint filler standard

Concrete News

Source: ASTM International, West Conshohocken, Pa.

ASTM Committee D04 on Road and Paving Materials’ D8139 – 17, Standard Specification for Semi-Rigid, Closed-Cell Polypropylene Foam, Preformed Expansion Joint Fillers for Concrete Paving and Structural Construction will inform practitioners specifying or finishing roads, gutters, curbs, parking lots and residential flatwork. Developed by Subcommittee D04.34 on Preformed Joint Fillers, Sealers and Sealing Systems with an eye to department of transportation plus architectural/engineering users, the document spans products exhibiting suitable compressibility, recovery from compression, nonextruding and weather-resistant characteristics. — ASTM Customer Relations, 877/909-ASTM

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InterCement taps Wall Street with Big Board listing of Argentina’s Loma Negra

Concrete News

Sources: Loma Negra Cia Industria Argentina SA, Buenos Aires; InterCement, Sao Paulo; CP staff

Argentina’s top cement producer raised nearly $1.1 billion in an initial public offering of American Depositary Shares (ADS), trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol LOMA. The early-November IPO saw the sale of 53,530,000 million ADS, priced at $19 each and representing five ordinary shares as traded on Bolsa y Mercados Argentinos S.A., Loma Negra’s home exchange.

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Insulating concrete forms rise to U.S.-record height at New York site

Concrete News

Sources: ICF Panels, Scotia, N.Y.; CP staff

ICF Panels will supply panelized insulating concrete forms in up to 50-ft. lengths for 42 Broad, a 249-unit, Westchester County, N.Y., development. The 16-story luxury apartment project will set a new height record for ICF-built structures in the U.S., taking a page from Ontario practitioners’ recent experience with mid-rise structures of comparable design near Toronto.

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Outdoor living trends sustain hardscape product category growth

Concrete News

Sources: Freedonia Group, Cleveland; CP staff

Demand for pavers, segmental retaining wall units, boulders and companion hardscape products is set to climb 5.6 percent annually through 2021, buoyed by growth in home building and popularity of outdoor living features. Over a five-year horizon in Freedonia’s new “Landscaping Products Market in the US, 5th Edition” study, pavers look to attain an annual growth rate just under 6 percent, reaching $1.4 billion in sales by 2021. Total hardscape category product shipments that year are projected at $3.5 billion.

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