CDE Asia: Facilitating 5% of India's total sand requirement through a sustainable ecosystem
What new business strategies is the company planning in the short term for business growth and expansion?
Having attained critical mass in business through solutions for producing manufactured concrete and plaster sand in India, we are currently focusing on two business strategies to create and maintain a sustainable M-Sand ecosystem. This includes investing in a new range of Combo solutions to produce IS standard M-Sand; and large-scale promotion of M-sand, which is a superior alternative to river sand and thereby arrest environmental decay.
CDE Asia has a total of 400+ installations in India, most of which are dedicated to the production of M-sand for concrete and plaster sand manufacturing purposes. Being the largest player in the M-Sand segment, the company has created a sand production capacity of 56 million tons per annum, and a market share of 5 percent, making us one of the largest contributors to the sand industry whose volume requirement stands at 1 billion tons per annum. We are also setting up an additional production unit in Kolkata to meet the increasing demand for M-sand.
Respecting this significant milestone, we are now looking to leverage our market share and wide experience to further improve our processing technologies so as to deliver quality sand as per specific project requirements and ensure that there is minimal loss of sand during processing.
At what rate is demand growing for M-sand in India?
The demand for M-sand is growing at the rate of 15-20 percent every year. This comprises close to 7-8 percent demand from the ready-mix concrete industry and the significant demand from the infrastructure & household construction sectors.
Currently, the total consumption of sand is projected at 1 billion tons per annum. Keeping this in perspective, estimates show that the per annum penetration of river sand is about 450 million tons while the rest 550 million tons is constituted by M-sand, VSI fines and quarry dust. It clearly indicates that the market is drifting away from river sand.
This gives us ample scope to promote superior quality M-sand producing solutions through our patented wet processing technology. We are continuously striving to deliver high quality sand at high yields by leveraging our global expertise in process engineering involving fluid dynamics. Also, we have a decided advantage over most of our competing players who are delivering unprocessed VSI/Crusher Dust that contains excessive levels of ultra-fines and particles and do not conform to IS383 specifications.
While CDE offers solutions for producing M-sand through both the wet and dry processes, we recommend the wet process technology for producing M-sand required for making concrete. The dry process can be used for asphalt road construction for de-dusting of crusher dust to reduce the level of ultra-fines before feeding the Asphalt batch mix plants, so as to optimize the heating cost.
What recent upgrades have been made in your Combo plant?
The new range of Combo solutions from CDE Asia is creating industry benchmarks in producing superior quality M-sand. Ever since Combo technology was introduced by us in 2014, the product has undergone more than two dozen changes based on user feedback and the experiences and learnings of our team.
A vital change has been made in the classification process itself for utilizing the waste silt and sludge (which constitutes 10-15 percent of the input) for making by-products from this waste. This has added significant material value to the final output while ensuring that 95 percent of the process water gets recycled during the production of M-sand.
Our improvisations in the rated output of the machine based on extensive research on rocks/materials such as limestone, granite, and so on, used for manufacturing sand, are helping us guide the customer in selecting the right solution.
We have made technological improvements to Combo’s water treatment process, which is now equipped to handle acidic water properties better, and new features have been introduced for the removal of oversize particles during the sand production process.
In fact, advancements have been made in all the models of our Combo series ranging from 30tph-200tph capacities. For instance, Combo Alpha displayed in Excon 2022 can produce three product variants and features a turbo dual wash technology. Additionally, our Cloudlink remote connectivity feature always keeps the Combo Software up to date for optimum performance of the plants.
How is CDE enabling the quarry owners to optimize their operations?
CDE Asia has provided growth opportunities for quarry owners by providing technology that facilitates the production of high-quality M-sand and washed aggregates from quarry waste, ensuring that the quarry operations are fully optimized.
Our eco-friendly technology helps produce superior and uniform quality M-sand, resulting in reduced cement consumption, consistent absorption rate, and, most importantly, no loss of sand during processing. This comes with the added benefit of silt being recovered as a by-product and being converted to bricks. The optimal utilization of the plant at the highest running capacity provides the best possible return on investments to the plant owners. We ensure maximum plant availability to our customers through AMCs including customized packages.
Through our revolutionary Doctor Sand initiative, we are helping plant owners maximize their plant utilization. We are supporting them to optimize their working capital cycles and giving them a platform for retailing their sand outputs to interested end users at the best market value. Through this strategy, we hope to create a stable and sustainable ecosystem for the increasing demand of M-sand in India, which will eventually save our rivers and help gain environmental immunity.
Our extensive R&D activities and vast experience in processing diverse materials in more than 100 countries have been the secret to our success in regularly exceeding our customer expectations.
NBM&CW August 2022
