Displaying items by tag: US

US: Solidia Technologies has entered a technology licensing agreement with CalPortland. The deal grants CalPortland limited rights to use Solidia’s patents, which can reportedly reduce the carbon footprint of cement and concrete by up to 50%. The limited licenses will allow CalPortland to use the Solidia technology to develop low carbon solutions. CalPortland also purchased certain laboratory and plant assets from Solidia.

CEO of Solidia Technologies, Russell Hill, said "CalPortland's unwavering commitment to decarbonisation of the cement and concrete industries makes it a great partner for continuing the vast development and research advanced by Solidia more than a decade ago."

US: Holcim has invested in Travertine, utilising the startup's technology to bind CO₂ from direct air capture into advanced mineral components for permanent carbon sequestration. This investment, made through Holcim MAQER Ventures, will scale Travertine’s technology for cement decarbonisation.

Chief Sustainability Officer at Holcim, Nollaig Forrest, said, "We're excited to work with innovative startups like Travertine to advance our goal of making decarbonised cement and concrete a reality at scale this decade. Driving circularity, Travertine reduces carbon emissions by capturing and binding CO₂ into advanced mineral solutions."

US: Queens Carbon has secured a US$14.5m grant from the US Department of Energy under its SCALEUP program. The funding will support the pilot of Queens Carbon's low temperature, ‘zero CO₂’ emission technology at an existing cement production site. Queens Carbon's supplementary cementitious materials, which replace 20-50% of the high-CO₂ binder in cement, will be produced at a pilot plant with a capacity of 10t/day.

CEO Daniel Kopp said “This SCALEUP grant is a tremendous step forward on our path to commercialisation. Partnering with the Department of Energy and a major cement industry player to deploy, operate, and optimise our 10t/day pilot plant will put us on an accelerated path to gigatonne-scale CO₂ reductions.”

US: A team at the University of Princeton has developed a new alternative cement using oyster shells. The team says that the oyster shells provide calcium carbonate in the form of aragonite, along with biopolymers. Together, these raise the resulting cement’s crack resistance by 19% and its ductility by 17% compared with ordinary Portland cement (OPC).

Team leader Reza Moini said “Our bio-inspired approach is not to simply mimic nature’s microstructure, but to learn from the underlying principles and use that to inform the engineering of human-made materials. One of the key mechanisms that makes a nacreous shell tough is the sliding of the tablet at the nanometer level. Here, we focus on the mechanism of tablet sliding by engineering the built-in tabulated structure of cement paste in balance with the properties of the polymer and the interface between them. In other words, we intentionally engineer defects in the brittle materials as a way to make them stronger by design.“

US: Heidelberg Materials has successfully converted its cement plant in Speed, Indiana, into a slag grinding facility. The facility ceased Portland cement production in 2023 following the opening of a new plant in Mitchell, Indiana, and now produces slag cement using domestically sourced slag granules. The Speed site has a grinding capacity of over 400,000t/yr and also functions as a distribution hub for the Mitchell plant's cement and other products.

US: Giant Cement Holding (GCH) has appointed Michael Greto as its Vice President of Supply Chain.

Greto joined GCH’s cement division in 2008 and previously worked as the company’s Director Of Logistics from 2019. He holds an undergraduate degree in transportation economics from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and Advanced Studies APICS Certifications in Supply Chain Management from Villanova University.

GCH, a subsidiary of Fortaleza Materiales, consolidates US-based cement companies Giant Cement, Keystone Cement, Dragon Products and energy recovery operations through Giant Resource Recovery.

US: Command Alkon has appointed Ron Carlson as Senior Vice President, Industry Liaison. The role will involve enhancing customer engagement, providing strategic industry insights, and fostering long-term relationships with key accounts.

Carlson previously worked as the Executive Vice President of Operations at Superior Materials, a Votorantim Cimentos North America company based in Detroit, and Wingra Ready-Mix and Stone Company based in Madison, Wisconsin. Prior to this he spent a decade with Ozinga Ready-Mix in Chicago. Carlson currently sits on the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association’s Operations Environment and Safety Committee, and he has also served as an elected board member of the Wisconsin Ready Mixed Concrete Association.

US: Saxum has appointed Jared Weston as General Manager for North American Operations & VP of Strategic Planning. He previously worked as Director of Sales and VP of Strategic Planning for the engineering and project management company. Earlier in his career he spent over 15 years working for FLSmidth, starting as a commissioning engineer in 2006 and becoming head of Capital Sales from 2020 to 2023. Weston is a graduate in Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering from Penn State University.

US: Representatives of the Portland Cement Association (PCA) and its members are meeting politicians at Congress to discuss cement sector decarbonisation on 12 and 13 June 2024. The PCA says that meetings will address permitting processes and new emission standards affecting the industry.

PCA president and CEO Mike Ireland said "There's a lot happening in Washington this year that directly impacts America's cement manufacturers, which is likely why we have a record turnout of cement company leadership in town for this fly-in. Our industry's top objective is to reach carbon neutrality. While our companies appreciate recent funding from the Department of Energy to assist in decarbonisation efforts, it's still challenging for them to make significant advancements due to a cumbersome permitting system and unrealistic Environmental Protection Agency regulations that could lead to eventual cuts in plant operations and staffing. As the infrastructure law is hitting its stride, the country needs more cement and concrete, not less. We're here to ask Congress to work with us to arrive at reasonable policies and standards that will allow manufacturers to continue to provide the resilient, sustainable building materials our country has come to expect."

North America: The Wildlife Habitat Council (WHC) has recognised Cemex’s conservation efforts in Mexico and the US with awards for four of its projects. These included its restoration of desert habitats at Cerro Jardín, Xoyatla and Coayuca in Atotonilco, Mexico. Cemex said that all of the projects advance its Future in Action strategy of sustainable excellence through circularity, climate action and water and biodiversity management, in line with becoming a net zero company by 2050.