Case Study
Having previously acquired Rugby Cement in 2000, the purchase of RMC in 2005 gave CEMEX a further foothold in Europe and made them one of the biggest building material companies in the world.
After the purchase, CEMEX earmarked the Northfleet site in Kent for a £2.5m development and investment programme. As a result of that investment, the site’s 40 staff today produce a staggering 600,000 tonnes of finished products a year in a highly efficient aggregate processing, ready-mix, paving and bagging operation on the relatively small 2.0 hectare site.
Adam Johnson, Deputy Wharf Manager explained how the site has been transformed, "CEMEX demonstrated its long-term commitment with a major investment in the new plant and it has totally transformed production. We can produce in 10 hours, what it took 16 hours to make before, and our energy consumption has been halved.” Johnson reports that CEMEX even lowered the height of the new plant to make less of an environmental impact on the skyline.
Around 6,000 tonnes of sea-dredged aggregates from the Kent and Sussex coast are brought in three
times a week by ship. These materials is loaded into a static Pegson Autocone crusher before passing through a static Powerscreen screener in a three-way split for a 20 and 10 mm gravel products and sand.
The finished products are rehandled by two Volvo L180 and one L150 loading shovels.
However, the site’s equipment all has to work at maximum efficiency to ensure that the new high standards of product quality and output are maintained, a problem CEMEX has solved by incorporating Pirtek Medway into its maintenance programme.
"As efficient as the new plant is, there is bound to be wear and tear and the occasional hose or component failure. I just have to phone Pirtek Medway and they are on site, usually well before the 1 hour ETA promise, and mostly within 40 minutes,” Adam Johnson concludes. “Their MSST will arrive armed with all our standard components. Pirtek Medway is well-organised, efficient, and well-versed in all aspects of health and safety, a key consideration for CEMEX. They give us simple solutions to our problems.”