Is Limestone Really Being Trucked Far Distances in Alabama?
Background: Casting Doubt
In the September 1st, 2022 Public Hearing for the Boulder County Planning Commission, Trpimir (“Trip”) Renić, EVP of Strategic Planning for CEMEX USA, referenced a cement plant in Alabama to argue that it would be an option for CEMEX to truck in all materials to their Lyons plant should Dowe Flats shut down:
“I’d like to give you an example of how extreme sometimes these situations are. There is a cement plant in the United States near Mobile, Alabama. It sources its limestone and shale-type materials from a location in Florida. It’s more than 360 miles away as the crow flies, about 470 miles away by road.” [link to video]
Art of Misdirection
Well, first of all, Trip (and the large team he works with) carefully crafted this message that implied the limestone was being trucked to the Holcim Theodore Cement Plant in Mobile Alabama, when in reality it makes more fiscal sense to send the materials by barge from Florida to Alabama.
The planning commission was certainly confused by this information, so let’s examine this more closely.
Holcim Theodore Cement Plant
Located in Alabama, the Theodore cement plant has been in operation since September 1981. The facility includes a dry process plant, four stations preheater, built along the Theodore Ship canal, located on a 17 acre site (50 developed and 125 wetlands/greenbelt). Theodore has 98 employees among plant operation, Crystal River Quarry in FL, and Distribution. The annual capacity of 1.5 million metric tons of seven types of cements.
“As the crow flies”, the Holcim Theodore plant is 360 miles from its limestone quarry in Crystal River, FL.
By road, the Holcim Theodore plant is about 470 miles from its limestone quarry in Crystal River, FL.
Upon closer examination…
So, now that we have ourselves oriented, let’s question the implications of Trip’s comment. According to a Tampa Bay Times article from 1994 from when the mine and plant were originally proposed:
“…all the limerock mined at the Crystal River site is shipped by barge to the company's cement plant in Theodore, Ala.”
Now that we’ve cleared that up, let’s look at the numbers.
Barges are much cheaper than trucks
According to the data collected by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, barge is the least expensive form of bulk transportation. Additionally:
Trucks are >600% more expensive than Barge.
Rail is >150% more expensive than Barge.
It’s their job to deceive - Skepticism is good
There’s a reason they didn’t say “nautical miles”. These are highly skilled senior executives at a Global 2000 multi national corporation. It is their job (and the job of the extensive teams they employ) to battle local governments on issues like this. They have decades of collective experience and specific playbooks on how to handle these situations to craft the outcome they are after. You must never take anything they say at face value!
