Global Gypsum Newsletter

Issue: GGM46 / 09 June 2020

Headlines


France: Saint-Gobain says that its overall group activity fell to 60% of 2019 levels in April 2020 due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. Since then its level of activity surpassed 80% ‘at comparable working days, with large variations by market and country,’ according to Regulatory News Service. The group expects a ‘challenging’ second quarter 2020 before a recovery in the second half of the year. It continues to preserve cash and reduce costs.

In Europe the group reported that, by the end of May 2020, Nordic countries had almost reached 2019 levels. Germany and Eastern Europe were still seeing activity levels below those of 2019. The UK has seen activity levels progress by around 10%/week since a low point in mid-April 2020 when activity were at a ‘virtual standstill’, reaching around 70% of 2019 levels in the last week of May 2020.

In the group’s Middle East & Africa region activity levels surpassed 50% of 2019 levels since a low in mid-April 2020. In France, activity in distribution came close to the 2019 level in the last week of May 2020, but with big differences by region and brand. Spain and Italy are picking up gradually, but remain below the average level of the region. The Netherlands remains close to a normal level of activity, while the Middle East and Africa remain impacted to varying degrees.

North America has reported a ‘contrasting situation state by state,’ but has shown improvement since the low point of mid-April 2020. Activity in May 2020 moved closer to 2019 levels due to ‘significant’ volumes in exterior solutions and a rebound in gypsum volumes. In Latin America, despite the health situation remaining difficult, activity is picking up week after week, from 40% in mid-April 2020 to around 80% in May 2020 with a ramp-up in Brazil.

In Asia-Pacific sales have now reached 2019 levels following the gradual restart of all its production sites in China in March 2020. India remains ‘severely’ disrupted with the restart dependent on the relaxing of confinement measures. The situation is varied across South-East Asia with a rebound in Vietnam where activity has surpassed 2019 levels, but disruptions still relatively significant in Thailand and neighbouring countries.


Australia: Knauf is reportedly looking for buyers for its business in Australia. The Royal Bank of Canada and PricewaterhouseCoopers have been helping the gypsum wallboard producer manage a potential sale, according to the Australian newspaper. The German company operates three wallboard plants in the country. They are thought to be worth up to US$200m.

Any such sale is likely to be related to Knauf’s acquisition of USG in 2019. The US-based company owns a 50% share in USG-Boral, which also operates wallboard plants in Australia. Boral said in April 2020 that it thought it unlikely that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) would approve its plans for USG-Boral so far. If Knauf were able to sell its other assets in Australia then its options with USG-Boral are more likely to be accepted. Speculation has mounted in the local press about partial or full asset divestments by Knauf in Australia since the USG acquisition.


UK: Planning permission has been granted by Newport City Council for a new gypsum wallboard plant to be built by Associated British Ports (ABP). The unit will be built on empty land to the south west of Newport Dock’s South Dock, according to the South Wales Argus newspaper. The building will be up to 202m long and 110m wide, with a maximum height of 21m. Gypsum for the plant will be delivered by ship. The project is expected to create up to 70 jobs. Once complete, the facility will be leased to a manufacturer by ABP.


US: The Gypsum Association has elected Gregory McCown as the chair of its board of directors for 2020 – 2021. McCown is the Regional Manufacturing Manager – Eastern US for CertainTeed Gypsum. Other appointments include National Gypsum’s Craig Robertson as vice-chair, Pabco Gypsum’s Emil Kopilovich, as treasurer and the Gypsum Association's Stephen H Meima continues as the secretary. USG’s Albert R Zucco is the past chair of the board. All terms are for one year and are effective from 1 May 2020.


Germany: Jürgens Maschinenbau has won first place in Kauf’s supplier of excellence awards for 2019. “The entire Jürgens team looks back on a long and successful cooperation with Knauf Engineering. We are particularly proud of this award and look forward to further challenges,” said Jürgens’ chief executive officer (CEO) Albert Andreas. The engineering company supplies supplier of fully-automatic automation and packaging machines for film and non-woven rolled goods.


US: Colin Hanson, one of the founders of gypsum wallboard moisture measurement expert Sensortech Systems, retired from his position of president of the company on 14 May 2020. A native of Southport in the north west of England, Colin Hanson established Sensortech Systems in Oxnard, California, along with Logan Mosteller and Bob Blankenship, in 1983. He had previously worked for leading moisture measurement equipment manufacturers in the UK and US and in the oil exploration sector in the UK.

Hanson was the pioneering developer behind Sensortech’s resonant frequency (RF) radio approach to moisture measurement. This offered higher accuracy, and hence control, to wallboard manufacturers, as it was more directly dependent on moisture content than the established techniques based on power-loss measurements. The RF approach has since risen to become the dominant approach to wallboard moisture measurement worldwide.

The company’s first product based on the RF approach was the ST-1100 moisture sensor range, which was replaced by the ST-2200 in 1992 and, subsequently, the ST-3300 range in 2018. Sensortech also produces the Instantaneous Moisture Profiling System (IMPS), which analyses moisture across the full width of the board, and has an extensive offering of near infra-red sensors. It most recently developed the Kiln Jam Detector for use inside board dryers.

As Sensortech grew in the 1980s and 1990s, Hanson took over the shareholdings of the other two directors. He became sole owner of the company in 1996. He sold Sensortech Systems to KPM Analytics on 14 May 2019, remaining as president until his retirement a year later. He will remain on hand in an advisory capacity and will continue to offer his insights and expertise to the company, with a focus on the development of existing and new products.

Speaking upon the sale of Sensortech to KPM, Hanson said, “There is a depth of talent within Sensortech, supplemented by KPM, that will provide a seamless transition to a successful future. KPM is putting resources into growing Sensortech, which is fantastic. The company has a development queue representing years of research but there are opportunities to accelerate that with KPM.”

Ron Geis, KPM Analytics’ President, has taken over the role of president of Sensortech Systems.


UK: British Gypsum says its wallboard capacity is at ‘approximately’ 80% of pre-coronavirus pandemic levels following the scaling up of its ‘Covid-19 safe’ operations and distribution plan. Managing director Matt Pullen said that the company’s plaster capacity was already at 80% and it was increasing supply volumes to merchant and distributor customers. It is continuing to allocate wallboard and plaster at lower levels than usual as it resumes normal production. It has also restarted taking new orders for its plasterboard recycling service. The subsidiary of Saint-Gobain shut down its non-essential operations in early April 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.


Switzerland: Saint-Gobain has started to sell its entire stake in Sika through its subsidiary Schenker-Winkler Holding (SWH). It previously acquired a 10.75% interest in Sika indirectly through the acquisition of 100% of SWH shares from the Burkard family in May 2018 as part of a global agreement with the Burkard family and Sika.

Saint-Gobain attempted to takeover Sika through acquiring a share of the company owned by the Burkard family in 2014. However, a legal counteraction followed and an attempt to transfer shares of Sika from the Burkard family was blocked by a Swiss court in late 2016. Saint-Gobain and Sika eventually ended the takeover attempt in May 2018 by retaining a 10.75% share in Sika, sales of other shares and other benefits. Following a two-year ‘lock-up period’ Saint-Gobain says it decided to dispose of its stake in Sika. It added that Sika chose not to exercise its right of first offer.


Spain: Knauf España has signed an agreement with the Arquitectes per l’Arquitectura association with the aim of supporting sustainable and universal architecture. The partnership compliments other initiatives Knauf holds in the country with the Higher Council of Colleges of Architects of Spain, the Green Building Council, the College of Architects of Madrid, the Alejandro de la Sota Foundations and Architecture and Society.


US: Gypsum wallboard distributor Foundation Building Materials reports that sales of wallboard fell slightly to US$202m in the first quarter of 2020. This was attributed to disruption caused by the coronavirus outbreak. Overall its sales across all business lines rose, in part due to an additional business day in the reporting quarter compared to the same period in 2019. It noted lower sales growth in states with stronger lockdown measures, including Washington, California, Michigan, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Overall sales in April 2020 were reported as being 20% down year-on-year.


US: The Gypsum Association (GA) has released a revised and updated environmental product declaration (EPD) for 5/8” (1.5875cm) type X North American gypsum boards. Following the standards set in the association’s recently revised product category rules (PCR) for North American gypsum panel products, the EPD provides environmental performance information addressing energy consumption, water consumption, global warming, waste, air emissions and other metrics related to production.

“The Gypsum Association has an ongoing commitment to environmental stewardship. The development and release of this new ISO 21930 compliant, Type III, cradle-to-shipping gate EPD, demonstrates our member companies’ efforts to transparently report environmental impacts as a means of contributing to sustainable design and construction,” said Steve Meima, Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Association, executive director of the GA.

Type X gypsum board is commonly installed in commercial, institutional and multifamily/mixed-use facilities. Where fire resistance ratings are required, type X gypsum board is typically specified. The GA has also produced an EPD for glass mat gypsum panel products that will be updated in 2021 under the new PCR.


South Africa: Waster water specialist Talbot is working with a coal producer in the Highveld region to remove gypsum generated as a by-product of its mine water purification process.

As part of a pilot project conducted in March 2020, a hydraulic filter press was used to dewater the solids, dry and press them into briquette form for transportation to end-use customers. The remaining filtrate was directed to an evaporation dam before returning to site processes via a blend line. Talbot says it reduced the waste solids from 84 - 2900mg/l and demonstrated that the technology would extract gypsum at a rate of 100kg/hr on a full-scale site operation. Previously the company has used this method on behalf of a South African platinum producer where the recovery of precious metals from a wastewater stream using the same technology.


US: Johns Manville’s (JM) filtration products plant in Richland, Mississippi started production of nonwoven filtration media for use in face masks in April 2020. JM’s Engineered Products business decided to build on its existing capabilities and help meet market demand due to shortages in the US and Europe in relation to the coronavirus pandemic.

“Johns Manville is in a unique position to serve a market that is fulfilling a great need across the world,” said Mary Rhinehart, president and chief executive officer (CEO) of JM. “Our high-performance nonwoven material is designed to provide high levels of filtration for various types of face masks. We are proud of our teams in Richland and throughout JM for finding new ways to support the communities and people who are on the front lines of this global crisis.”

JM says its media meets or exceeds Level 1 BFE 95% (Bacterial Filtration Efficiency) and VFE (Viral Filtration Efficiency) requirements. These results were verified by a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) registered laboratory.