In discussion: Mike Ireland, PCA President & CEO

Global Cement speaks with the Portland Cement Association (PCA) President & CEO Mike Ireland about the association’s recent achievements, its sustainability commitments and hopes for the Biden Administration.

Global Cement (GC): How has the US cement sector been affected over the past 12 months?

Mike Ireland (MI): I am fortunate enough to work with cement company CEOs, their skilled staff and those in the wider global cement industry. By pulling together, they have all helped our industry register some incredible achievements against the background of what has been a very difficult period for the entire world. In the US we also dealt with a very trying election year and related political and social disruption.

The US cement industry suffered in 2020 due to the pandemic, but by working together our safety, education, and collaboration programs helped keep life-loss to a minimum. However, like the products it produces, the sector was resilient, with surprisingly little disruption. Our forecasters were extremely busy providing ongoing advice to our members on a weekly basis early in the pandemic, which certainly helped them to navigate this difficult period.

GC: What were PCA’s main achievements in 2020, against this difficult backdrop?

MI: Early on in the pandemic, PCA, its members and allies were able to contribute to the successful classification of cement and concrete as ‘essential industries’ at both Federal and local levels, which provided a license to operate. We continued to collaborate with our concrete sector partners to find ways to promote our products, with more than 30 webinars on salient subjects like cement plant safety during a pandemic. This helped on the safety side primarily, but also on the production side, because it gave plant operators and their staff the confidence to continue to work.

However, I would say most important for PCA in the midst of the pandemic was that the CEOs came together to speak as one voice and develop a longterm focus on a long-term strategy for the cement sector in the US. This was along three lines: Sustainability, infrastructure and market development. We have worked out communications strategies, both internal and external, for our plans regarding these three points.

One that readers may already be familiar with is the Ambition Statement for the US cement sector to achieve climate neutrality across the concrete value chain by 2050. The first step in this is the creation of a Roadmap, which has been in development since late 2020. It is expected to be approved by PCA leadership by the end of the third quarter of 2021. This will show the steps required and levers we will pull to achieve this goal.

As part of this, PCA has spoken to Cembureau, the European Cement Association, about the development of the European roadmap. The major carry-over is the appearance of the 5Cs approach, namely reduction of emissions from: clinker, cement, concrete, construction and built environment and (re)-carbonisation. We have also been coordinating the development of the Global Cement & Concrete Association’s global roadmap.

GC: What conclusions has PCA come to so far regarding its own roadmap?

MI: It is clear that cement is the single most significant part of the concrete value chain that gives rise to CO₂ emissions. Therefore a lot of the onus to reduce emissions will fall on our sector. That makes it clear, from where I’m sitting, that CO₂ capture and utilisation / storage (CCUS) will be a major part of our sector’s efforts towards climate neutrality. Of course, we will also have to work with our other partners to reduce emissions across the board.

GC: How will the US roadmap be different from those that have come before?

MI: The process of making cement, putting it into concrete and constructing buildings is not hugely different between different countries, so the main levers that have to be pulled are common.

The incentives to reach our goals will differ from other parts of the world. For example a tax on emissions akin to the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) would not go down well here. Instead, tax breaks can be a good way to incentivise sustainable practices. Look at the 45Q tax credit for CO₂ capture. It pays US$20/t of CO₂ permanently sequestered and US$10/t used in enhanced oil recovery. This has already spurred a number of CCUS projects. Looking ahead, I think there is an opportunity for us to work with politicians, specifically the Department for Energy, to accelerate the development of all of the levers we need.

GC: What could be the cost implications of fullscale CCUS across the US cement sector?

MI: The costs of these measures will have to be shared along the concrete value chain and society as a whole. Cement producers generally have small margins and they cannot be expected to take on the entire cost burden single-handedly. The goal of sustainability is a common one. There is no real alternative for cement and concrete as a strong, ubiquitous, inexpensive and durable building material. It is also the best material that will help us stand up to the challenges of climate change. I think there is a strong argument that mankind will be unable to survive meaningfully in the future without concrete.

GC: How is PCA acting to improve the public perception of concrete?

MI: We are in the process of restarting the launch of our Shaped by Concrete campaign, which was initially launched in January 2020. This was paused due to the onset of the pandemic in March 2020. Due to the very busy summer and autumn news cycle with Covid-19, the election season and social unrest, we decided to wait until 2021 to restart the roll-out, which is now ongoing. This will bring our stance - that cement and concrete are the sustainable materials of the future - to the attention of a wider audience. For example, the recarbonisation of concrete during use doesn’t garner enough attention and that’s something PCA wants to change. Research indicates that the CO₂ reabsorbed over the lifetime of a building can be as much as 20 - 25% of the CO₂ originally emitted during its production.

Once we get to the point where the sector is net CO₂ neutral and then it starts to take up CO₂ from the atmosphere, it would become a CO₂ sink, almost like a forest. This would be a truly amazing transformation. There’s no other material that could do this job! It’s really exciting for the sector and it is great to be starting on this journey.

GC: How has PCA’s relationship with other building materials associations developed over the past 12 months?

MI: Relationships with the associations that cover other parts of the construction industry have become even stronger over the past 12 months. We are heading up the American Concrete Alliance and have taken on some of its back-office tasks. We completed construction of a brand new office building in Washington DC in the second half of 2019 that is intended as a space for PCA and its partners. Of course this has been mostly empty to date. Hopefully that situation will change soon.

We are also part of the Highway Materials Group. This even includes representatives from the asphalt group, a traditional competitor to our sector. We share back-office staff with this group and other associations. This makes each association more effective at doing the things that actually make a difference to their members.

On the international front we are an associate member of the GCCA, with whom we meet digitally on a regular basis and share best practice. There will be more opportunities for deeper collaboration in the future, particularly regarding the sustainability roadmaps we discussed earlier.

GC: How is the PCA dealing with the remoteworking aspect of the pandemic?

MI: Like everyone else, we have been working extensively from home and online. Unfortunately we were forced to cancel the annual IEEE-IAS/PCA Cement Industry Technical Conference in 2020 and have converted the 2021 edition into a virtual event. We are able to function without physical meetings but you cannot recreate those little bits around the edge of a real-world conference that add that extra layer of value. There can be no unexpected meeting in the lift, off-the-record bar chat or other opportunity to properly ‘take the pulse’ of the sector. People need that real-world connection. I hope we can get back to these soon. We currently have a real-world event scheduled for the third quarter of 2021.

GC: What does PCA hope to see from the Biden Administration?

MI: PCA hopes that the incoming Biden Administration will continue to enhance funding, research and infrastructure for CCUS to help the sector significantly reduce CO₂ emissions. Government incentives will be crucial to developing this technology. I think that we are now at the point where the ‘capture’ part is sorted. That’s because it can be controlled by the plant. It’s the ‘utilisation’ and ‘storage’ parts that will need external help, not just for our sector, but for all industrial sectors that emit CO₂. A major part of this will be new Federal pipelines, not for oil or gas, but for CO₂.

The Federal Government will have to enact procurement policies and incentivise the development of lower-CO₂ cements. We know you can get a 10% emissions reduction just by using portland limestone cement. This is a low-hanging fruit! The new Administration can also help by lowering the barriers to the use of byproducts from other sectors, for example coal combustion and the steel sector, which provide some of the lowest-cost short- to mediumterm opportunities to reduce CO₂ emissions from our sector.

GC: How do you think the relationship with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will develop under Biden?

MI: When you have a change of US Administration anyone dealing with government departments is liable to suffer whiplash. That said, our relationship with EPA has been collaborative and strong under both of the previous administrations. President Biden has signed executive orders that seek to address climate change and environmental justice. We see the cement sector as a solution to these challenges rather than a problem and we look forward to working with the Administration, EPA and other government departments towards this goal.

GC: You mentioned some of the lowhanging fruit just above in terms of supplementary cementitious materials. What low-hanging fruits can be found on the alternative fuels side?

MI: It is no secret that the US is, in some ways, behind other major cement producers in terms of waste processing and the use of alternative fuels, which probably represent the lowest hanging fruit for our sector. The PCA needs to be enthusiastic when speaking to EPA, decision makers, the public and other stakeholders about this subject. We will have a hard time cutting through the well-funded landfill lobby, but there are major opportunities in this area.

GC: What is the biggest threat to PCA members in the next 1 - 5 years?

MI: In the short- to medium-term the biggest obstacle is Covid-19 and how our country handles the rise of any new variants amongst its population. The fundamentals of our sector are otherwise fairly strong.

GC: What is the biggest opportunity over the same time period?

MI: There is a great need for infrastructure renovation in the US and I am more optimistic than I have been in a long time that the current Administration will be able to address that. We are confident in President Biden’s ability to not politicise this issue too much and to reach across the aisle to get things done. There is not only the need, but it’s also a big job generator that could really help the country as it moves out of the pandemic.

For its part PCA will continue to press for a well-funded long-term Surface Transportation Authorisation Bill and the continued solvency of the Highway Trust Fund, with an emphasis on low-CO₂ concrete. MIT has also shown that concrete surfaces save 2% of vehicle CO2 emissions during use compared to asphalt and they reflect, rather than absorb light, reducing the urban heat island effect. So a major commitment to surface transportation would be a major boon to our sector. Our percentage of the pie will be as large as it is normally, regardless of the size of the pie. Better to have a pie than no pie at all.

GC: Thank you for your time today.

MI: A pleasure as always!