The Environmental Coalition on Standards (ECOS) and other founding members launched the Alliance for Low-Carbon Cement and Concrete (ALCCC) in May 2023. Since then, its membership has more than doubled to 28 companies and associations within the European cement and concrete space.
Global Cement (GC): Please would you introduce the Alliance for Low-Carbon Cement and Concrete (ALCCC) and its work?
Joren Verschaeve (JV): The ALCCC brings together stakeholders from along the cement and concrete value chain based on a common interest in decarbonisation through material innovation. We are building a scientifically-backed case, supported by experience from other markets, to show how European cement and concrete can decarbonise faster.
In fact, they may be best-placed to reach net zero fastest out of all energy-intensive industries – by 2040, if all pieces of the puzzle can be put in place.
Our newly updated roadmap takes a complete view, focused on the EU 2024 – 2029 policy cycle. The existing industry associations may not be best-placed to do this, because they often represent clinker producers or other narrow interests along the value chain.
GC: What is the ALCCC’s roadmap?
JV: Our roadmap consists of three headings, namely:
1 – Establishing a framework: We must remove EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) free allowances, recognise cement and concrete as fast-to-abate, and update Best Available Techniques (BAT)
reference documents;
2 – Strengthening the EU internal market: This means a shift to performance-based standards and harmonisation of European standards;
3 – Developing markets and finance: Policy-makers must increase investment, implement the Energy Performance for Buildings Directive and make
procurement sustainable.
GC: What is the current state of the European transition to alternative cements?
JV: Current policies give no incentive to reduce the clinker factor of European cement. On the contrary, it penalises initiatives like the redeployment of a clinker plant to produce supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs), due to loss of free allowances. From a narrow economic point of view, it makes sense to protect a given asset and keep on producing for as long as possible. In view of climate change, this is not working.
An abundance of SCMs and geopolymer binders are already on the market in Australia and North America. SCMs include industrial byproducts, the majority of which are already available at scale, at near-to-zero extra cost, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Material innovation can reduce the need for more expensive, energy-intensive technologies to get rid of residual emissions. Putting our group’s solutions into the equation makes the whole transition easier, cheaper and faster. One of our most important successes so far has been increasing awareness of this.
GC: What about construction and demolition materials (CDM) recycling?
JV: In Europe, CDM is an abundant, under-used resource. As we move into a circular value chain, levels will drop slightly, but so will demand for cement and concrete, balancing this out.
We still downcycle CDM for use in back-filling, when a lot of technologies allow for higher-end recycling, with new developments still emerging, like electric cement recycling. This is an interesting time.
GC: What other nascent technologies are on the ALCCC’s radar?
JV: Another area gaining traction across Europe is glass recycling, both for SCMs and inclusion in concrete. There is a lot of interesting research, but uptake depends on local market traditions.
Too often, the debate circles around a ‘silver bullet’ solution that is globally scalable. As a result, there are a lot of actors, all starting from completely different propositions. Before ordinary Portland cement (OPC) clinker use became general, however, cement production was fragmented, and varied according to local feedstocks. The ALCCC represents a return to this way of thinking, for instance by looking to regionally-available industrial waste streams.
GC: How can policy accommodate this thinking?
JV: New SCMs for use in EU cement production are established through the European Committee for Standardisation. The process requires support from a number of its members, namely the national standards organisations of the member states. However, if a product only exists in a handful of countries, incentives to take it to the European level are lacking. This difficulty has historically prevented the uptake of suitable industrial byproducts, such as bauxite in Belgium and Greece, and mine tailings in the Nordic countries. Switching to a performance-based standard would allow for different local approaches.
GC: Why does Europe need performance-based standards?
JV: Failure to revise cement standard EN-197 in line with the performance-based Construction Products Regulation risks litigation, standstills and the possibility of Europe falling behind other markets. Startups presenting a business case tend to pick the more open markets, and the same is true when large companies come to scale-up clean technologies.
Legislation can also drive the demand side. Requiring sustainable choices in public procurement is a huge potential lever, representing almost 40% of concrete sales globally, and gives a clear signal to the market. Countries like Ireland are capping clinker content in concrete in public works. We support these measures, and also think that they should be harmonised across Europe, given the existence of the internal market. In order to avoid red tape outside of the bloc, we must uphold the same rules internally.
GC: How important is the planned phase-out of EU ETS free allowances?
JV: Carbon pricing incentivises clinker producers to look into new solutions. There also needs to be a level playing field: while they continue to receive free allowances, these should also be made available to the SCM segment on a technology-neutral basis.
Cement is not generally an intensively-traded commodity – most trade in the EU is intra-European, or between EU member states and candidates like Ukraine. This is not an industry where claims of carbon leakage ought to stall the phase-out.
GC: How can alternative raw materials contribute to net zero cement and concrete by 2050?
JV: When we launched the ALCCC, we published a report conservatively estimating that material innovations can reduce cement’s CO2 emissions by 60% by 2050. The progress of our member companies and wider changes in mindset have rapidly outdated that thinking. Studies show ever-greater potential for decarbonisation through these materials. Nature reported earlier in 2023 that the combination of SCMs and recycled clinker could supply the entire concrete market in the UK. There is now a major European research consortium, Detocs, which involves cement producers Cementos Argos and Mannok, and ALCCC members like ECOS and circular concrete developer C2CA. It believes that clinker-to-cement ratios in Europe can drop to 40% by 2030. With AI, a clinker-to-cement ratio of 25% by 2035 could also be achievable.
Roadmaps cannot be updated quickly enough, but they are being updated in the right direction. There are good examples within the industry, such as California, where legislators are shortening the transition timeframe. Associations are reassessing what is possible, and finding answers in alternative raw materials. This remains politically sensitive, with a lot of focus on competitiveness and geopolitical tensions. It is always easier to maintain a status quo, but pressure is mounting towards a tipping point. Things will change fast if some of the large incumbents get involved, as they are beginning to.
GC: What is next for the ALCCC?
JV: We will continue to grow and expand. We recently admitted three new members from different parts of the value chain: Norway-based cement-free concrete developer Cemonite, France-based calcined clay producer Neocycle, and Belgium-based trade association Groen Beton Vert. We have also had a number of new membership applications. The accession process is at its core a series of conversations to ensure that our views align, so things can move quite quickly.
There is a new EU policy cycle, a newly elected European Parliament, and a new Commission has just entered office. There is a lot of work to be done in getting to know the legislators, making sure we are part of conversations and getting our message across.
Thinking about other levers of decarbonisation, this is not a zero-sum game: it is about placing all of them at the centre of the debate, then seeing how best to change roadmaps in order to make net zero cement and concrete a reality. We are getting a lot of interest, so clearly our message is resonating with the industry.
GC: Thank you for speaking to us, Joren.
JV: My pleasure!
