Slight decrease in non-residential and residential building
The downward business trend in Germany as a consequence of the global financial crisis has not only become apparent in a drop of the overall cement consumption but has also caused shifts as regards the relative importance between the main building sectors. Thus, residential building with a share of 22.5 % (5.7 million t) of the cement consumption reported a new low (Fig.). At the turn of the millennium the share of residential building still amounted to roughly 36 %. Also non-residential building, i. e. capital spending for building construction effected by the industry and trade, suffered a slight decrease in 2009 as regards the use of the building material cement. After this building construction segment had risen strongly in 2007 and 2008 as a consequence of the economic growth and had finally reached a share of more than 41 percent, there was again a drop to below 40 % to 9.9 million t (39.3 %) in 2009. On the other hand, civil engineering reached a peak value of cement consumption with a share of 38.2 % (9.7 million t) in 2009 compared to the previous year, certainly also due to the economic stimulus packages of the government. However, it could not oust non-residential building from its position. Altogether the relationship between building construction and civil engineering amounted to 61.8 to 38.2 % in 2009 (after 64.6 % to 35.4 % in 2008).
These changed market contours result from the current estimates of the working group “cement forecast” in the Federal German Association of the Cement Industry. The goal of these estimates is to analyze the use of cement for individual product groups and applications as well as to determine the markets for cement and cementitious products. The calculations are based on statistics of the association, official production statistics and expert estimates.
With decreasing cement consumption in Germany, the shares of the kinds of cement processing have remained unchanged to a great extent during the last few years. 54.8 % of the total cement consumption of 25.4 million t in 2009 (after 27.6 million t in 2008) were used to produce in-situ concrete, i. e. ready-mix concrete (11.3 million t) or site concrete (2.6 million t). Further 31.6 % (8.0 million t) were used to produce precast concrete units. 5.2 % (1.3 million t) are related to the manufacture of mortar, plaster, screed and products of construction chemistry. The remaining 8.4 % (2.1 million t) have to be assigned to further different applications, amongst other things as shotcrete, for soil stabilization or mining products.
