Leilac-1, a pilot plant and R&D facility at Heidelberg Materials’ cement site in Lixhe, Belgium, has successfully completed an operations campaign demonstrating the stability and performance of the Leilac technology. This campaign followed the installation and commissioning of a new calciner tube suitable for electrification, marking an important step toward hybrid-electric operations.
Building on earlier campaigns, recent operations at Leilac-1 achieved two key milestones:
- Stable & Flexible operations: The plant operated continuously for 21 days, while at the same time quickly and flexibly responding to ramp operations up and down as required by the host cement plant.
- Validated performance: The plant delivered the targeted calcination rates and the successful separation of unavoidable process CO₂ at multiple tonnes per hour of material throughput. The results strongly correlated with the technical models that underpin Leilac’s proposed scale-up strategy, thereby supporting Leilac’s economic value proposition at commercial scale.
Operational flexibility
The campaign demonstrated the Leilac technology’s ability to operate flexibly and responsively, functioning safely within a host plant’s control hierarchy. The Leilac-1 plant is integrated to an operational cement plant, and the system is equipped to adjust quickly to the host plant’s needs. The Leilac technology uses a flash calcination approach, meaning material residence times are measured in seconds, and the technology can quickly ramp production up or down as required. Its ability to quickly halt production while efficiently maintaining temperature ensures the technology is well suited to the realities of cement operations.
Operational simplicity
A 24/7, on-site team operated the Leilac-1 plant. The team included a number of newly trained staff who were able to fully support safe plant operations within a few weeks. At scale, the Leilac technology is designed to be run by the existing cement plant operations team, with minimal training and added labour costs.
‘Whilst I had some background in plant operations, I had never operated a plant like Leilac-1 before. Despite being new to the system, I managed to get up to speed relatively quickly and felt comfortable manning the controls within a week or so. I think the low training burden likely speaks to the operability of the core technology. I imagine an established cement plant operations team would be able to run this process easily.’
Neil Wardrop, Technical Writer and member of the Leiac-1 operations team
Scaling from Leilac-1
Since being commissioned in 2019, Leilac-1 has continued to be used to derisk the core technology; testing individual components – such as multiple material conveying options – process conditions, and helping to evolve the value that can be offered by the technology to cement and lime producers. The latest extended demonstration run produced valuable performance data to further support Leilac’s technical models. The operations team tested numerous process parameters, recording and analysing each, to gain deeper insights into plant behaviour, and the drivers of steady state performance. As an example, over 200 meal samples are typically taken and analysed from multiple points in Leilac-1’s process per operational month. The results generated from this campaign provided further validation of the expected performance of Leilac’s next generation designs and will feed into future projects. The ability to operate in a truly hybrid setup is expected to be the next major evolution to the Leilac-1 plant, enabled by the recent calciner tube design upgrade.
Leilac-1 continues to demonstrate the effective separation of unavoidable process CO2 from the cement manufacturing process, ready for use or storage. However, the potential value of indirect heating to the cement and lime industries extends beyond just carbon capture. Leilac aims to prove that the technology can deliver flexible and switchable heating options for its partners. The technology is designed to be compatible with a broad range of fuel and energy sources, and different options could be deployed and alternated between, to both lower running costs and cut emissions.
In future campaigns, Leilac intends to electrify the inner calciner tube to demonstrate dual-fuel, hybrid-electric operations. The hybrid fuelled i-Leilac technology is being designed to dynamically shift between both fuel and electricity, whilst delivering continuous heat for stable production. This option could allow manufacturers to optimise their energy costs and would create scope for the provision of valuable grid load balancing services.In this way, a hybrid electric Leilac plant aims to provide a unique opportunity for the cement and lime industries. By integrating what may be considered a ‘carbon capture technology’, a Leilac plant could produce their main product, capture unavoidable process CO2, and potentially lower energy costs and/or provide a new additional income stream from grid services at the same time.
Leilac-1 continues to serve as a testbed for technology development. By validating these concepts in a commercially relevant environment, Leilac is aiming to prove that indirect heating can enable lower carbon emissions, lower energy costs, and greater operational flexibility, making it easier for facilities to adopt and adapt this technology to evolving industry needs.
“The success of the recent campaign at Leilac-1 was a testament to both the robust nature of our technology and the commitment of our purpose-driven team. Our team’s dedication, in partnership with Heidelberg Materials and especially the CBR host plant team, was key to delivering new milestones for our Leilac-1 plant, and important proof points that help validate the huge potential of the Leilac technology.”
Vincent Nguyen, General Manager, Operations, Leilac
