Cement Firms Talk of Shortage
The nation is facing a shortage of cement that could snag the new construction boom and slow down the national economic recovery, according to cement industry spokesmen.</br></br>They say air pollution regulations for new cement plants and federal price controls will cause the shortage to get worse, and they have presented their case to the Commerce Department and filed a suit to stop the Environmental protection Agency (EPA) from enforcing its regulations.</br></br>The shortage has hit Florida hardest because that is where the housing boom is strongest, resulting in construction delays, rationing by manufacturers . and soaring prices for products such as cement block and bag cement.</br></br>But government experts o^ the construction industry say j the cement makersÛª lament isj exaggerated, coming more j from a repressed desire to | cash in on the economic up-j turn with big profits than j from a fear of construction in- j dustry catastrophe.	,</br></br>Nationwide, the cement in-! dustry now operates at nearly 95 per cent of its maximum ca* j pacity, according to Commerce | Department estimates. As re-j cently as 1970 the industry! had 20 per cent of its productive capacity idle because of lag in demand after it expanded widely in the early: 1960s in expectation of a boom i that never came.