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Welcome to CONCRETE CURRENTS, the electronic newsletter from
Concrete Products magazine.
For additional industry news, technology, and highlights from the latest
issue of Concrete Products, please visit www.concreteproducts.com
Submissions for upcoming issues of CONCRETE CURRENTS or Concrete
Products can be directed to Editor Don Marsh, don.marsh@penton.com or
312/840-8483.
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Ambitious $450 billion highway bill may hit
speed bump
Source: National Stone, Sand & Gravel Association,
Alexandria, Va.
At a June 18 Capitol Hill news conference, the Democratic and
Republican leaders of the House Committee on Transportation and
Infrastructure released their blueprint for the next surface
transportation authorization bill. Almost immediately, NSSGA leaders
hailed Committee Chairman James Oberstar (D-Minn.) for unveiling the
six-year, $450-billion “Surface Transportation Authorization Act of
2009.” Details of the act were released in a 100-page report outlining
policy and procedural reforms that will be included in the bill now
being drafted. Click
here for full story
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Cemstone brings high-reactivity metakaolin SCM
into mainstream mix design
Sources: Cemstone Products Co., Mendota Heights, Minn.; CP
staff
Under a new partnership with Calgary-based Whitemud Resources Inc.,
Cemstone has begun using WhitemudMK high-reactivity metakaolin (HRM) as
a supplementary cementitious material in concrete mix designs for
heavy/civil work. The premier WhitemudMK source in the U.S., Cemstone
will promote the material through its 50-plus ready mixed plants in
Minnesota, western Wisconsin and northern Iowa. Circle
here for full story
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PCA: Will EPA regs foster ‘OPEC’ factor
for domestic cement consumers?
Sources: Portland Cement Association, Skokie, Ill.; U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency
A proposed hazardous air pollutant regulation for the cement
industry undermines the balance between environmental protection and
economic viability, potentially forcing U.S. concrete producers to turn
to foreign powder sources, PCA noted at EPA hearings June 16-18 in Los
Angeles, Dallas, and Arlington, Va. The hearings addressed amendments to
the national hazardous air pollutant emissions standard covering
mercury, total hydrocarbons, hydrochloric acid and particulate matter.
If adopted, PCA contends, they would undermine the domestic cement
industry’s stability and endanger thousands of jobs. Click
here for full story
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Prairie, Rinker veteran Glusac to head
Aggregate Industries
Source: Aggregate Industries U.S., Rockville,
Md.
Effective July 1, William Glusac succeeds Aggregate Industries U.S.
President and CEO Nabil Bouris. Glusac joins the Rockville, Md.-based
ready mixed and aggregate giant with 25-plus years’ industry
experience, including senior positions with Chicago-based Prairie
Material Sales (where he served as president, pre-Cemex), Rinker
Materials Corp. (president of Florida Materials), and Vulcan Materials
Co. He has most recently served in a consulting capacity with U.S.
Concrete Inc. and other clients.
Glusac will report to Bill Bolsover, chairman of the board and CEO of
Aggregate Industries UK and Aggregate Industries Ltd. The company’s
four regional (Western, Mid-Atlantic, Midwest, Northeast) senior vice
presidents will report to Glusac, as will the head of the Building
Materials Division.
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Holcim buys Cemex’s Australian operations at
fire-sale price
Sources: Cemex S.A.B. de C.V., Monterrey, Mexico; CP
staff
Just shy of the two-year anniversary of Cemex’s $16 billion
acquisition of Australia’s Rinker Group, the Mexican building
materials giant has agreed to sell its entire Australian operations to
Swiss-owned Holcim Group for about $1.64 billion. The assets divested
include 249 ready-mixed plants, 83 quarries, and 16 concrete pipe and
products plants. The sale also includes Cemex’s 25 percent stake in
the four-plant, one-grinding-mill Cement Australia, with an annual
production of 5.1 million metric tons. Click
here for full story
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Engineers trace concrete creep to calcium silicate
hydrate shifting in matrix
Source: Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
Cambridge
Calcium silicate hydrate (C-S-H) granules’ tendency to rearrange
into altered densities--some looser, others more tightly packed--leads
to creep, the deformation concrete experiences under loading. In a
National Academy of Sciences paper, MIT engineers contend that their
nano-scale observations of C-S-H allow measurement of specimens’ creep
properties in minutes versus the conventional method of gauging
deformation trends over a year-long period at macroscopic view. Click
here for full story
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Senate Dems' Clean Water Act expansion fosters
sweeping federal power grab
Source: CP Staff; National Ready Mixed Concrete
Association, Silver Spring, Md.
The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee approved in a vote
along party lines (12-7) the Clean Water
Restoration Act (S. 787), empowering the Environmental Protection
Agency and Army Corps of Engineers with authority far beyond the
original Clean Water Restoration Act. By changing the 1972 law’s scope
from “navigable waters of the United States” to “waters of the
United States,” the legislation extends the federal government’s
reach to storm sewers, retention basins, roadside ditches, seasonal
streams, and any activities affecting all waters in the country. Click
here for full story
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NCMA, ICPI explore mutual promotion, member
support strategies
Sources: National Concrete Masonry Association, Herndon,
Va.; CP staff
During a recent two-day session in Chicago, NCMA and Interlocking
Concrete Pavement Institute representatives discussed how their groups
could jointly promote paving stones and segmental retaining wall units,
as well as support development of hardscape unit contractors/installers.
Click
here for full story
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Post-Rockwood Equipment Design Group rebranded
Rusticator Machinery
Source: Rusticator Machinery, LLC, Rochester,
Minn.
In-line concrete masonry and hardscape unit surface
treatment/distressing specialist Equipment Design Group is now operating
as Rusticator Machinery, with Bradley Price at the helm. Spun off from
Rockwood Retaining Walls Inc., Rusticator Machinery maintains an
Equipment Design Group division for engineering and plant installations.
Click
here for full story
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Berkeley coasts to victory in National Concrete
Canoe Competition
Source: American Society of Civil Engineers
Among engineering students from across the U.S. and Canada
participating in ASCE’s National Concrete Canoe Competition in
Tuscaloosa, Ala., University of California-Berkeley contestants captured
‘America’s Cup of Civil Engineering’. This year’s event, hosted
by the University of Alabama, marked the 22nd Annual National Concrete
Canoe Competition and Berkeley’s first championship since 1992. The
230-lb., 20-ft. “Bear Area” bested vessels from 21 other engineering
schools.
The Berkeley team’s closest competitors were second-place Ecole de
Technologie Superieure, manning its 190-lb., 20-ft.-long “Vintage”
vessel; and, California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo,
finishing a close third with its 246-lb., 20-ft.-long canoe, also named
“Vintage.” For their top finishes, the Berkeley, ETS and Cal
Poly-San Luis Obispo teams earned $5,000, $2,500 and $1,500 in
scholarship money, respectively.
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