Concrete Innovations Environmental Impacts of Building Materials

New insights are becoming apparent daily about the world’s most widely used and sustainable building material – concrete.  The material that has been the basis of civilization for centuries is now a leading innovation that will help reduce the built environment’s carbon footprint.

This is the main message from Tien Peng, Senior Vice President of Sustainability, Codes, and Standards for the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association, in an inspiring presentation in the Pathway to Resilience and Carbon Neutrality webinar series from the Pacific Northwest Building Resilience Coalition.

In his presentation, Tien outlines current and future innovations of concrete, such as using supplementary cementitious materials instead of higher carbon products that reduce the embodied carbon content of concrete.

He addresses the need to switch from rigid specifications to performance-based specifications to minimize cement content to what is necessary to satisfy the engineered requirements. In doing so,  concrete in the built environment sequesters carbon through a natural process known as carbonation, becoming a carbon sink.

Enhanced carbon capture through injection of CO2 into concrete in the batching cycle to mineralize the CO2 with the aggregate. And how each of these technologies does not stand alone and that we must use all of them together to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.

Few people are as qualified to address the current and future innovations of concrete that policymakers and design professionals should consider as they assess the environmental impacts of building materials to maximize resilience and performance and deliver lasting value as Tien Peng.

As an architect and mechanical engineer, Tien draws on his knowledge as a reviewer for the International Code Council’s National Institute of Standards and Technology; he explained why concrete is strong, resilient, non-combustible, energy-saving, and affordable clear leader in sustainable construction.

He demonstrates how concrete could materially lower a building’s (or a community’s) energy costs by its design, shape, colour, and use while providing safe, affordable, livable homes, schools, hospitals, and public places.

Tien explains how most of the carbon emissions associated with concrete occur during cement manufacturing. This substance binds aggregate and steel to make the concrete that allows us to build bridges, roads, skyscrapers, and homes.

Such innovations capture carbon dioxide and other sites from industrial processes and turn them into high-tech solutions to combat climate change. More importantly, concrete reabsorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, which means the built environment is a massive carbon sink, rivalling the natural habitat – our forests and grasslands – as an effective way to keep greenhouse gas emissions out of the atmosphere.

Tien’s presentation is one of six webinars organized in 2021 by the Pacific Northwest Building Resilience Coalition in partnership with the Pacific Northwest Economic Region.

You can watch this inspiring webinar here. More information on this webinar series is available here.