CSR to buy Fla. Crushed Stone West Palm Beach, Fla.-based CSR America continues to expand with the announcement that it will purchase the cement and aggregate company FCS Holdings and its subsidiary Florida Crushed Stone Co. (FCS) for $348 million.

CSR America officials said it was too early to say whether FCS's Leesburg, Fla. headquarters would remain in operation after the sale is finalized pending regulatory approvals.

The FCS acquisition includes: a dry process, 600,000-tpy cement plant at Brooksville; a 4 million-tpy aggregate quarry at Brooksville; three limerock quarries in west central Florida; and other assets including a small sand mine in southern Georgia, a specialty cement products plant near Orlando, and aggregate and cement transport operations.

CSR America is the largest cement user in Florida. Including FCS, it will sell and use about 3.6 million tpy, but manufacture only 1.8 million tons.

Cemex in talks with Cimpor Mexico's Cemex said it was considering the purchase of 10% of Cimentos de Portugal (Cimpor), Portugal's largest cement producer, according to an article in The Wall Street Journal in late May.

The acquisition, valued at $200 million, would allow Cemex to consolidate some of its overseas properties, since both companies operate plants in Spain and Egypt. Besides opening the door to Portugal, the stake also would allow Cemex access to markets in Tunisia, Brazil, Mozambique, and Morocco. Cimpor officials have yet to comment on the talks between the companies.

Suwannee American awards equipment contracts Going against the tide of consolidation in the cement industry, Suwannee American Cement has selected Krupp Polysius to design, engineer, and supply equipment for its 750,000-tpy greenfield production line in Branford, Fla.

Around the time the partnership with Polysius was announced, a state administrative judge ruled in favor of Suwannee's request for an air-construction permit.

The new plant will include a longitudinal A-frame portal reclaimer with a 400-tph capacity of raw materials; a roller mill for grinding 192-tph raw mix; a preheater with precalciner with a 13-ft-diam x 158-ft-long, two-station kiln for producing 2,300 tpd of Type 1 clinker; a clinker cooler with a six-row x eight-plate state pre-grate; a high-efficiency separator for producing 136 tph of Type 1 cement; a cross-belt analyzer for analysis of major oxides and other raw material key elements; and a plant control system.