Shoreham Cement Works: UK March 2015

Shoreham Cement works is based in a chalk quarry in West Sussex.

There is near on 300 years of industrial history at this site. Originally just a chalk pit around the 1730's until the lime kilns were added in 1814. By the 1850's quarrying here was in full effect. Soon after a railway line was added to improve the distribution needs of the site.

It wasn't until the late 1800's that cement was being produced here, by 1890 output capacity was 144 Tonnes a week.

The first rotary Kilns were introduced here in 1899 and producing by 1900. At the forefront of technology this was quite possibly the first successful installation of rotary kilns in the UK.

During the 1940's capacity was nearly peaking at 100,000 tonnes per year. This wasn't deemed enough, a large improvement plan was put forward and the whole site was rebuilt between 1948 and 1950. This brought state of the art technology to the site including two huge rotary kilns that were107 metres in length. This improved the output capacity to over 400,000 tonnes a year.

Production came to an end here in 1991 and distribution finished in 1997. The site is still used by an aggregates firm who still have a licence to excavate chalk here. As for the production buildings, well they are left to rot.