We invited you to the 11th SEC Technology Tour in the Eichsfeld region from 12-13 Sep 2021. The programme included a guided tour of the romantic half-timbered town of Duderstadt, a dinner together followed by an overnight stay in the Duderstadt area. The next day focused on the "technology" part: in the morning we had the opportunity to learn about the processing of plastic waste, which serves as fuel for the neighbouring cement works. To round things off, we visited the cement plant in Deuna in the afternoon.

Duderstadt

Duderstadt is one of the most beautiful half-timbered towns in Germany, which we visited on the afternoon of our arrival day, a Sunday. Afterwards, we travelled to Fuhrbach, where we had dinner together and spent the night.

Plastic processing

The next morning, we had an appointment with the B+T Group in Deuna . The B+T Group (based in Alsfeld) is a supra-regional association of individual companies from the waste disposal sector. It takes on tasks in northern Hesse, Lower Saxony and Thuringia. Its strength lies in logistics; at the Deuna Zement GmbH site, secondary fuel is produced from pre-sorted commercial waste in line with the requirements of the cement plant and used there directly as fuel.

Deuna cement plant

The Deuna cement plant of Dykerhoff GmbH was founded in 1975 and today produces around 2 million tonnes of cement per year, especially cement for precast concrete parts. The secondary fuel from B+T is burnt there in two huge rotary kilns. It accounts for around 80% of the fuel used at the Deuna cement plant. The tour also included a bus trip to the open-cast limestone mine north-west of the cement plant.

A report on the excursion appeared in the Nachrichten aus der Chemie: Nachr. Chem. 2021, 69 (12), 91.

Wolfgang Gerhartz
Hans-Uwe von Grabowski
in July 2021