Cementos Molins achieves 75,000 tonnes of recovered waste on the first anniversary of its alternative raw materials plant

The MPA plant, located in Pallejà, Barcelona, prevents industrial and construction waste from ending up in landfill and can be used to manufacture new materials.

Cementos Molins is celebrating the first year of operation of its alternative raw materials plant (MPA), located in the municipality of Pallejá (Barcelona), with an important milestone. The company has announced that on its first anniversary the plant has managed to recover more than 75,000 tonnes of non-hazardous construction and demolition waste, as well as other non-hazardous industrial waste.

The Cementos Molins alternative raw materials plant, which has a surface area of more than 3,250 square metres, was inaugurated in September 2022 after an investment of 1.7 million euros. With the start-up of the plant, Cementos Molins is able to provide comprehensive waste management, from the ideal storage service, as well as collection and transport to the recovery plant, guaranteeing the minimum environmental impact throughout the waste management cycle.

According to Carlos Martínez, Chief Strategy and Sustainability Officer of Cementos Molins, “our commitment to the environment is intrinsically linked to our business model. Therefore, at our MPA plant we provide a second life to industrial and construction waste that would otherwise end up in landfill, generating high quality sustainable products and avoiding the consumption of natural resources. The plant has enabled our cements to incorporate 12.7% alternative raw materials in their production process. We are also working to reduce the carbon footprint of all our concretes and to ensure that all of them use recycled aggregate in their manufacture.

Commitment to circularity and decarbonisation
The MPA facility, with a potential capacity of more than 200,000 tonnes, receives waste in coarse, granular, powder and sludge formats. Two types of treatment are carried out at the plant. On the one hand, crushing and screening, in which waste from concrete plants is processed to produce recycled aggregate with CE marking, which accounts for 12% of the total waste recovered. On the other hand, the second treatment consists of the dosing and homogenisation of industrial and construction waste to manufacture new alternative materials for the production of our cements, which represents the remaining 88%.

The installation of alternative raw materials is a key commitment of Cementos Molins to circularity and decarbonisation of the sector. This plant avoids the direct emission of more than 2,000 tonnes of CO2 per year, equivalent to the emissions produced by more than 750 cars per year. In addition, the plant’s location, close to the cement factory, considerably reduces the cost of transporting raw materials. “It allows us to make the most of our own resources, while at the same time saving CO2 emissions in the processes of transporting raw materials and manufacturing our products. This procedure allows us to avoid the extraction of more than 75,000 tonnes of material from the quarries, which extends the useful life of our quarries and enhances the sustainable use of natural resources,” says Martínez.

Commitment to the environment
Cementos Molins’ commitment to the circular economy is in line with the objectives set out in its “Sustainability Roadmap 2030”, a roadmap that will lead the company to cut its CO2 emissions by 20% by 2030. This commitment will mean an acceleration in the emission reduction plans that the company has been undertaking since 1990 and focuses on the strategic objective of supplying carbon-neutral concrete by 2050.

Thanks to its commitment to alternative raw materials and the investment in development and technology made at its MPA plant, Cementos Molins was the first company in Spain to obtain a new marking for coarse recycled aggregates at the end of 2022, just six months after the inauguration of the plant. This marking complies with all the requirements of the Structural Code which, from November 2021, replaces the EHE-08 standard. It is a very high quality recycled aggregate, certified for use in the manufacture of structural and non-structural concrete.