A digital toolkit for model-based design and simulation of modern cement plants

This work presents a comprehensive digital modelling toolkit for the design, simulation, and optimisation of modern cement plants. Cement manufacturing involves complex multiphase thermo-chemical phenomena across the preheating tower, calciner, rotary kiln, and clinker cooler. Existing modelling approaches often rely on simplified thermodynamics, combustion mechanisms and lumped kinetic treatments that limit their applicability to today’s modern, alternative fuel intensive plants. To address these gaps, we develop a library of standardised physics-informed models implemented within Siemens gPROMS®, incorporating detailed mass and energy balances, heterogeneous reaction kinetics, multi-phase heat and mass transfer, and rigorous thermodynamic property estimation. Validation against published industrial data across multiple plant scales demonstrates predictive accuracy, with most deviations and relative errors falling under 5–10%. The toolkit is further deployed to assess a main cement decarbonisation pathway, which is related to the substitution of coal with alternative fuels. Ten scenarios involving Meat and Bone Meal (MBM), Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF), and Wood Waste Fuel (WWF) at different substitution rate are evaluated from a technical and environmental standpoint. Overall, the digital toolkit provides a high-fidelity, flowsheet-integrated simulation environment that enables rigorous optimisation of fuel strategies, thermal integration, and decarbonisation pathways for next-generation sustainable cement manufacturing.