My understanding so far has been that there is still no cement manufacturer that can produce netZero cement without offsetting. If up to 600 kg of CO2 are emitted per tonne of cement, around 400 kg are due to the processing of the material and 200 kg to the energy. I suspect that Brimstone is working on replacing limestone. Nothing is said about the use of energy. Votorantim is trying to reduce emissions in the energy segment by using leftovers from the sugar cane harvest. According to reports, this has been achieved by 10%. Companies such as Orcan Energy use the waste heat from cement production to provide new energy for production.
If all the possibilities on both the material and the energy side are exploited, there is the potential to significantly reduce CO2 emissions without offsetting. However, as the ETS prices for CO2 have fallen significantly in the EU, there seems to be currently no pressure to use innovative processes and new materials. Actually, the rise in cement prices in particular would allow investment in this segment.
Re low-carbon cement: Brimstone's process not only "avoids the otherwise inevitable loss of CO2 to the atmosphere in the production process" (typically about 0.8 tonCO2 per ton cement); they also "have a path to sequester up to 1 ton of CO2 per ton of cement", and to do so at "cost parity or better".
My understanding so far has been that there is still no cement manufacturer that can produce netZero cement without offsetting. If up to 600 kg of CO2 are emitted per tonne of cement, around 400 kg are due to the processing of the material and 200 kg to the energy. I suspect that Brimstone is working on replacing limestone. Nothing is said about the use of energy. Votorantim is trying to reduce emissions in the energy segment by using leftovers from the sugar cane harvest. According to reports, this has been achieved by 10%. Companies such as Orcan Energy use the waste heat from cement production to provide new energy for production.
If all the possibilities on both the material and the energy side are exploited, there is the potential to significantly reduce CO2 emissions without offsetting. However, as the ETS prices for CO2 have fallen significantly in the EU, there seems to be currently no pressure to use innovative processes and new materials. Actually, the rise in cement prices in particular would allow investment in this segment.
Re low-carbon cement: Brimstone's process not only "avoids the otherwise inevitable loss of CO2 to the atmosphere in the production process" (typically about 0.8 tonCO2 per ton cement); they also "have a path to sequester up to 1 ton of CO2 per ton of cement", and to do so at "cost parity or better".
[https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/sites/default/files/2022-10/nc-SB%20596%20Workshop%20Brimstone%20Presentation.pdf]
Also, another zero-carbon cement producer worth mentioning is Sublime Systems.
[https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240325443080/en/Sublime-Systems-Selected-by-U.S.-Department-of-Energy-to-Receive-87M-Investment-to-Accelerate-Commercial-Scale-True-Zero-Cement-Manufacturing-Technology]