Sublime Systems’ Post

BACKING CEMENT DECARBONISATION⚡♻️👷🧑🔬🇬🇧: Cambridge Electric Cement (CEC), a low-carbon, recycled cement start-up, has closed a £2.25 million seed funding round. Zero Carbon Capital, a decarbonisation-focused investor, led the round, investing alongside existing investors Legal & General, Cambridge Enterprise Ventures, Parkwalk Advisors, Delph25, and Almanac Ventures. This investment will enable CEC to industrialise production of its sustainable cement at Celsa Steel UK’s EAF facility in Cardiff, deliver a real-world construction demonstrator, and advance offtake agreements with partners and customers. Concrete is a critical material in our built environment; we use half a tonne of concrete every year for everyone alive. But it’s responsible for 7.5% of total carbon emissions – triple that of aviation. Decarbonising cement (the energy and CO2-intensive concrete component) is a massive challenge; CEC offers a solution. For the full story🗞️, click here➡️🖱️: https://lnkd.in/emHHWwGP Close up of a cement kiln pic: Photo 262358829 Wirestock Dreamstime.com University of Cambridge Pippa Gawley John Bromley Chris Gibbs Bill Yost Poppy Brewer Cyrille Dunant Patricio Alfonso Burdiles Dr Philippa Horton GCCA – Global Cement and Concrete Association World Cement Association Mineral Products Association Aggregates Europe - UEPG The Institute of Quarrying Ioannis Giannakopoulos Mike Higgins Philip Jarvis Shiju Joseph Raul M. Tim Monroe Aimee McCracken

I always get excited by research advances like this. Simultaneously, I can't get a nagging thought out of my head. Is anyone else skeptical that decarbonizing cement will actually happen in a globally meaningful way? It's hard to believe it could be replaced for any kind of construction above a few stories. Easy to use, widespread labor force trained to apply it, known risks and liabilities for insurance and loans, well-established industry standards on quality, etc... There's a limit to how far it could be decarbonized with additives -- maybe 20%? 30%? The idea that a supply chain involving shipping tons of demolished concrete to recycling centers will come into existence at scale feels unrealistic. What would be the unit economics necessary for covering those costs? The cost of construction in the 21st century post-pandemic is already considered to be extremely high, where would the recurring revenues be coming from to sustain this activity or the political will to make building even more expensive? As an industry, my best guess is that alternatives could be found for buildings one or two stories tall, and concrete could be phased out for those uses. Compressed earth blocks, mass timber, and other fast-growing woods seem like possibilities. For the rest, I don't see why business as usual won't continue indefinitely and be balanced through some form of carbon offsets unrelated to cement manufacturing like planting trees or carbon credits where those markets exist. #sustainability #cement #recycling #circulareconomy #construction #building

Did you know that the cement industry alone is responsible for a massive 8% of global CO₂ emissions! 😮 In the UK, several startups are stepping up to create carbon-negative concrete solutions! Here are a few: 🔹Seratech Ltd is using olivine, a naturally occurring mineral, to create concrete that captures CO₂ and turns it into a carbon-negative building material. 🔹Biozeroc is pushing the boundaries with bio-based materials that eliminate cement altogether, significantly slashing emissions. 🔹O.C.O Technology Ltd is transforming waste CO₂ into carbon-negative aggregates, locking carbon directly into the very materials we use to build. 🔹Cemfree - Ultra-Low Carbon Cement has developed "zero-cement" concrete, utilizing industrial byproducts to cut emissions without sacrificing strength or durability. 🔹Concrete4Change is taking things further by enabling concrete to absorb and permanently store CO₂, turning it into a carbon sink during the curing process. These innovations are reshaping our future, paving the way for sustainable, climate-positive construction. 🌱 What do you think? Is carbon-negative concrete the breakthrough we need to decarbonize the construction industry? #NetZero #Sustainability #CarbonNegative #ConcreteInnovation #GreenBuilding #ClimateAction

#Concrete and #cement producers worldwide are realizing significant gains in #decarbonization efforts, with European innovations leading the way. The Daily Commercial News and Construction Record lists notable developments that are impacting our industry. Read more below:

Huge improvement: 40% less cement to make a concrete product with the same, or even better features 🔥 Today Carbonaide is happy to launch the first commercially available products with Rakennusbetoni- ja Elementti Oy that utilize our precision curing technology, originating from VTT's research. With this kind of results, the launch is even more fun! The first products work as an excellent example of how that precious, captured #CO2 is put to its best use. The majority of its decarbonization effects come in fact from the utilization of CO2 and carbon removals are just a happy extra feature. But vital - and permanent. This describes our technology quite nicely: we are not just pushing new ingredients to the concrete mix but improving efficiency. In other words: Making more with less. Check more info on our press release. Now let's decarbonize the rest 💎 https://lnkd.in/daPV_R68

Absolutely thrilled to welcome Eliot Brooks, Freddie Scott, William Knapp, and the entire Cocoon team to the Wireframe portfolio, and lead their pre-seed round! Steel and concrete are widely considered some of the toughest industries to decarbonize; responsible for 14%+ of GHG emissions today. The scale of these sectors -- with concrete being the second most used substance in the world after water -- makes it extremely difficult for any new technology to make a dent on operations or emissions. But with demand for building materials growing rapidly as we invest in modern cities and infrastructure, solutions that can deliver cost-effective carbon impacts in the short-term is exactly what we need. Enter Cocoon. The company's novel approach leverages existing feedstocks, flow sheets, and supply chains to produce low-carbon cement from slag, all while increasing the profitability of sustainable steel operations. More on why we're convinced that their scalable, shipping container sized system can be the winning solution for these historically hard-to-abate sectors + the progress they've made in just 15 months here: https://lnkd.in/ezzTWtaw

At Terra, we believe that affordable, consistent, high-quality, and more sustainable concrete will come from true innovations in materials and technology and not from incremental improvements to the existing cement supply chain. Over the past year, we've spoken with experts, conducted research, and taken a deep dive into what it’s going to take to unlock true construction decarbonization and disrupt the carbon footprint of cement. From policy to technology and process, we believe deeply in the responsibility and opportunity of this industry to make a remarkable change for the world at large. We're excited to share a full report on these topics and even more excited to start the conversation. #cementforhuamnity #zerowasteconstruction #greencement #netzero #greenbuilding 

Green cement can reduce the carbon emissions by up to 40% by using a carbon - negative manufacturing process. #Fortera, a Silicon Valley tech company just opened the first green cement factory in the USA and vows to reduce the carbon emissions by 70%. How is done? The CO2 is mineralized into a reactive form of calcium carbonate that can be used in the cement. The process speeds up carbon mineralization, which naturally occurs over thousands of years, in order to remove more CO2 in a shorter amount of time. The Forteta plant can capture 6,600 tons of CO2 and produce 15,000 tons of ReAct cement each year and is planning to integrate green energy sources to achieve zero net. #fortera #contech #proptech #building #construction #zeronet #ReAct #siliconvalley #california #usa #siliconvalleyproptechassociation

🌍🔑 #LC3: A Gamechanger for Low-Carbon #Cement! In a recent article by ClimateWorks Foundation, LC3 technology is highlighted as a key innovation for cement decarbonization. With its strategic Technical Resource Centres in the Global South, this project is paving the way for a global shift towards limestone calcined clay cement, offering a sustainable solution for reducing the carbon footprint of one of the world's most critical materials. Learn how LC3 can accelerate the transition to low-carbon cement and drive global change. (Click in post below 👇) #Sustainability #ClimateAction #Decarbonization #GlobalSouth #LC3Cement

The Makupa Causeway Bridge in Kenya is 457 meters long. It spans the Makupa Causeway, which links Mombasa Island to the Kenyan mainland. According to Bamburi Cement PLC, the bridge was built using their sustainably produced Duracem Cement which reduces carbon emissions by 64%. In the context of the article by ClimateWorks Foundation below, I see there is much to be shared among cement producing industries on Calcined Clay Cement (LC3) which is an emerging innovation transforming the cement industry and which has already been adopted by such companies like Cementos Argos of Colombia. Global Alliance for the Future of Food Alliance2015 Welthungerhilfe (WHH) State house Kenya