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Green Cement Absorbs Carbon
Peace Corps Online writes "Concrete accounts for more than 5 percent of human-caused carbon dioxide emissions annually, mostly because cement, the active ingredient in concrete, is made by baking limestone and clay powders under intense heat that is generally produced by the burning of fossil fuels. Now Scientific American reports that British start-up company Novacem has developed a 'carbon-negative' cement that absorbs more carbon dioxide than it emits over its life cycle. The trick is to make cement from magnesium silicates rather than calcium carbonate, or limestone, since this material does not emit CO2 in manufacture and absorbs the greenhouse gas as it ages. 'The building and construction industry knows it has got to do radical things to reduce its carbon footprint and cement companies understand there is not a lot they can do without a technology breakthrough,' says Novacem Chairman Stuart Evans. Novacem estimates that for every ton of Portland cement replaced by its product, around three-quarters of a ton of CO2 is saved, turning the cement industry from a big emitter to a big absorber of carbon. Major cement makers have been working hard to reduce CO2 emissions by investing in modern kilns and using as little carbon-heavy fuel as possible, but reductions to date have been limited. Novacem has raised $1.7M to start a pilot plant that should be up and running in northern England in 2011."
No mention in the article of the strength of the new material. How would this compare to regular concrete?
"The building and construction industry knows it has got to do radical things to reduce its carbon footprint and cement companies"
Seriously? At least here in the Midwest (USA), construction bids still go to the lowest bidder and there are huge piles of construction waste that go straight to the landfill. They won't change until someone makes them change.
:wq
Even if it is negligible, "going green" is the trendy thing to do nowadays, so as long as it seems like they're making an effort, that's far more important than if it actually helps.
Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
and by that phrase, I mean its popular bullshit. Most of the "green" things that have been devised over the past few years do NOTHING other than hold the carbon and make it the next generations problem instead. I thought the entire idea here was to NOT do that, but then again we live in an excessively hypocritical society that makes things up so they can make money, and this may just have been the latest and greatest. I'm not saying environmentalism is bad, but the majority of it so far isn't actually doing any good for the environment, its just helping the stock holders behind the products involved.
"They confiscated everything, even the stuff we didn't steal!"
Frankly, the mention of the term "carbon footprint" puts this squarely in the "hype" category.
Why did that get modded 5 insightful? Carbon Footprint is a valid and useful term.
The only reason I can see why some might like the above comment is if they are so conservative on climate change, they reject even the terms used in discussing it.
It would almost qualify as an example of the logical fallacy known as the "Appeal to Ridicule" but it wasn't quite intelligent enough.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_ridicule
-- the only thing we have to fear is really scary things
Why not just plant more trees around buildings made of concrete? That seems to me to be a more useful, long-term "incentive" program than some we've seen lately.