Displaying items by tag: Sustainability

UK: UK Concrete and the Mineral Products Association (MPA) have launched a roadmap for the concrete and cement industry to become net negative by 2050. It plans to do this through decarbonised electricity and transport networks, fuel switching, greater use of low-carbon cements and concretes as well as carbon capture, use or storage (CCUS) technology.

“We have already made significant progress to reduce carbon emissions but are under no illusion about the scale of the net zero challenge,” said Nigel Jackson, chief executive of the MPA. “Achieving this will require the wholesale decarbonisation of all aspects of concrete and cement production, supply and use. The concrete and cement industry as one sector alone cannot deliver net zero and we will only be able to go beyond net zero with concerted support from government, as well as with significant changes across the wider construction, energy and transportation sectors.” He added that the roadmap could be delivered without offsetting emissions, offshoring production facilities or ‘carbon leakage.’

The ‘Roadmap to beyond net zero’ calculates the potential of each technology and the carbon savings which can be achieved. CCUS technology is vital to delivering net zero manufacturing and according to the roadmap will deliver 61% of the required carbon savings. It intends to achieve a net negative industry by 2050 by the ability of concrete to absorb carbon dioxide during use and the thermal properties of concrete in buildings and structures to reduce operational emissions.

The MPA is also lobbying the government for a financial support model including for the capital and operational costs of carbon capture by no later than 2021. This is desired to ensure the technology can be developed, deployed and become an investable proposition in the 2030s.

France: Social housing developer Immobilière 3F says that it has signed a contract with construction company Groupe GCC for the use of Hoffmann Green Cement Technologies' 78% reduced-carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions concrete for the construction of an 85-unit housing project in Saint-Leu-la-Forêt, Île-de-France.

Groupe GCC says that it participated in the development of the concrete as part of a three-year development partnership agreement with Hoffmann Green Cement Technologies signed in July 2020.

India: The city corporation of Mysore, Karnataka and non-governmental organisation (NGO) Susthira have announced plans to set up a waste building materials recycling plant. The Projects Today newspaper has reported that the corporation has purchased a 20,000m2 site in the suburb of Kuppalur on which for Susthira to build and operate the plant, which will process waste cement slabs and concrete bricks from construction and demolition sites.

Spain: The Andalusian Labour Foundation for Cement and the Environment (FLACEMA) has announced the shortlist for the Award for the Best Communication on Sustainable Development in the Andalusian Cement Industry 2019 - 2020. The jury will select a winner from 19 articles by 13 writers, published between 1 January 2019 and 31 May 2020, taking into account “aspects such as the journalistic quality of the piece, its rigour and provision of data, the sources consulted and the investigativeness of the work” in highlighting the regional cement industry’s commitment to “principles such as sustainable development and the circular economy.”

FLACEMA said, “Due to Covid-19, 2019 – 2020 presents a novel situation. As such, the jury has especially taken into account those works on sustainable development in the industry that address initiatives designed to combat the outbreak.”

The jury announces the winner of the Euro2000 prize and runner-up for the Euro1000 prize on 1 November 2020.

Mexico: Cemex says that Carbon Trust has validated its roadmap to decarbonise global operations in line with the Sectoral Decarbonisation Approach (SDA) 2-degree scenario (2DS) developed by the International Energy Agency (IEA). The validated roadmap is intended to help the company to achieve a 35% reduction of net carbon emissions by 2030. The findings validate Cemex's roadmap for reducing Scope 1 and 2 emissions.

The Carbon Trust has assessed the technical feasibility of the plan based on guidelines defined by international institutions including the International Energy Agency, the Cement Sustainability Initiative, and the European Climate Research Alliance. The CO₂ reduction methods include the use of alternative fuels, using decarbonated raw materials, renewable power projects, and novel cements, among others. The validation also included a review of Cemex's commitment to implement the scheme based on governance mechanisms and business planning.

“The magnitude and complexity of change required by a company such as Cemex to decarbonise its global operations is significant. Our assessment provides the organization’s management, investors and stakeholders with an independent validation that its commitments are backed up by sound assumptions and planning,” said Aleyn Smith-Gillespie, Associate Director Advisory at the Carbon Trust.

India: Dalmia Bharat subsidiary Dalmia Cement has joined five leading companies of other sectors in signing the Near-Zero pledge, an industry charter targeting “near-zero carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions by 2050” at the virtual Climate Week NYC. The Times of India newspaper has reported that the pledge consists of a commitment to “undertake carbon sequestration efforts, if needed, and set reporting indicators and targets to enable tracking of corporate goals on the decarbonisation pathway.”

Dalmia Cement urged national governments to “positively enforce targets for efficiency, emissions reduction and circular economy to make carbon neutrality by 2050 a reality.”

Spain: LafargeHolcim subsidiary Holcim España has announced the launch of the Carbon Challenge, a think tank to promote CO₂ emissions research and reduction. The company says that the plan involves “the formation of various working groups in areas such as reducing process emissions, reducing the emission factor for fuels and changing cement content of concrete and investigating alternative additives.” This is part of its Ecological Transition strategy, in addition to its Euro20m carbon footprint reduction investments announced on 31 December 2019.

Sustainability and Health director Raúl Pérez said, “We have high expectations for this project. It is a laboratory of ideas that will allow us to add and share knowledge that materialises in concrete initiatives applied to our processes, products and solutions, all with a common denominator: anticipating the new European decarbonisation scenario with an established plan to be carbon neutral by 2050.”

Cemex last week. HeidelbergCement and LafargeHolcim this week. China yesterday. One can’t seem to move for major building materials companies (or their owners) issuing carbon neutral strategies at the moment. This week HeidelbergCement first launched its ‘Beyond 2020’ plan, a mixture of financial, portfolio and sustainability goals. Then, LafargeHolcim said that it had signed a pledge with Science-Based Targets (SBT) towards meeting intermediate targets by 2030. Last night, President Xi Jinping told the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in New York that China was aiming to hit peak emissions before 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060.

The timing of these various sustainability goals are directly or indirectly linked to Climate Week NYC, a notable annual event on the climate change calendar that is taking place at the moment. So it’s a good time for large-scale industrial CO₂ emitters, like building material producers, to have something positive to say.

China’s announcement steals the limelight given that the country produces around half of the world’s cement and holds a higher share of clinker production capacity. Western media has pointed out the geopolitical implications of Xi’s statement that was delivered shortly after a speech by US president Donald Trump, a notable climate change sceptic. Xi’s speech didn’t contain any details so it may simply have been an attempt to demonstrate global leadership. Yet if the Chinese government makes a go of it, the effect could be profound. Data from the Centre for International Climate and Environmental Research (CICERO) shows that the Chinese cement industry emitted an estimated 782Mt CO₂ in 2018 compared to 1.50Gt CO₂ from the cement industry globally and 37.1Gt CO₂ from all human-related sources. In other words, the Chinese cement industry was responsible for 2% of all CO₂ emissions in 2018. And this industry is mostly owned by a government that has just publicly declared a carbon neutral target.

In some ways the other announcements, by the western-based multinational building material companies, are even more radical since these producers are subject to market forces. These companies don’t have to do this. They also contain more specifics than Xi’s words so far.

HeidelbergCement says it has brought forward its CO₂ emissions target for 2030 of 525kg CO₂/t (specific net CO₂ emissions per tonne of cementitious material) to 2025. That’s a 30% decrease from 752kg CO₂/t in 1990. Its new goal for 2030 is below 500kg CO₂/t. The main emission reduction methods it outlines include: increased use of alternative raw materials and fuels; increased use of secondary cementitious materials to reduce the clinker factor of cement; investment in plant efficiency and CO₂ reduction at the plant level; and increased share of low-carbon concrete products.

Chart 1: HeidelbergCement’s path to net carbon zero concrete: Source: Leading the way to carbon neutrality, HeidelbergCement.

Chart 1 above outlines HeidelbergCement’s thinking post-2030 with further reductions to CO₂ emissions mainly achieved through circular economy methods and different carbon capture techniques. Two points to hold in mind here. One: note the current uncertainty about which route will provide the biggest share of the reduction. Two: this chart considers concrete, not cement.

LafargeHolcim’s announcement was that it has joined Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) ‘Business Ambition for 1.5°C.’ It says that by doing so it has become the first global building materials company to sign the pledge with intermediate targets for 2030, validated by SBTi. This is slightly confusing given that other building materials companies have had different dealings with the SBT as it has worked towards its current scheme. Earlier this month, for example, we reported that Taiwan Cement had started an SBT project in 2019 and had some targets approved by the SBTi in June 2020. Grupo Cementos de Chihuahua (GCC) said it was joining SBTi at the start of 2020 and HeidelbergCement reported its SBTi approved targets in mid-2019. Finally, India-based Dalmia Cement is also on the SBTi ‘Business Ambition for 1.5°C’ list but it is a stretch to describe it as a ‘global’ company.

The core of LafargeHolcim’s statement is a further reduced target for CO₂ intensity in cement of 475kg CO₂/t by 2030. So far it’s decreased its CO₂ intensity by around 23% to 516 kg CO₂/t in 2019 from ~730kg CO₂/t in 1990. There’s less looking ahead after 2030 compared to HeidelbergCement but the measures outlined until then include: more use of low-carbon and carbon-neutral products; increased use of alternative raw materials and fuels; doubling waste-derived fuels in production to reach 37%; greater use of calcined clay and developing novel cements with new binders; and operating the company’s first net zero CO₂ cement production facility.

Many of the various networks and initiatives across the climate action community came together in June 2020 as part of the UN backed ‘Race To Zero Campaign,’ an attempt to align the disparate leading net zero initiatives ahead of the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP), due to take place in November 2021 in Glasgow, Scotland. This swirl of different net zero schemes also partly explains the confusion over the different organisations backing sustainability targets that companies can sign up to. So it’s a good thing to see closer collaboration here.

More cynical readers will have latched on to president Xi’s opportunity to show up President Trump in the climate change action stakes. They may also prefer news stories about activist investors prompting change at shareholder-owned companies as they increase their portfolios or stories like Morgan Stanley’s announcement this week that it has a new commitment to reach net-zero financed emissions by 2050. If the investment bank actually means it and other financiers follow suit then the fiscal incentives for net zero draw closer and the rest should follow. Moneys talks… and hopefully CO₂ stays buried in the ground.

For sustainability comparisons among the top global cement producers see the October 2020 issue of Global Cement Magazine

Switzerland: LafargeHolcim has signed the Science-Based Targets initiative (SBTi) Business Ambition for 1.5°C pledge, which commits it to net-zero carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions by 2050. Additionally, the company has committed itself to a 20% reduction in its CO₂ intensity between 2018 and 2030.

The company says that over the period it will: “accelerate the use of low-carbon and carbon-neutral products such as ECOPact and Susteno, recycle 100Mt of waste and by-products for energy and raw materials, scale up the use of calcined clay and develop novel cements with new binders, double waste-derived fuels in production to reach 37%, reach net CO₂ emissions 475kg/t of cementitious material and open and operate its first net-zero CO₂ cement plant.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Jan Jenisch said, “I believe in building a world that works for people and the planet. That’s why we are reinventing how the world builds today to make it greener with low-carbon and circular solutions. I am very excited to be working with SBTi, taking a rigorous science-based approach to shape our net zero roadmap and accelerating our efforts to substantially lower our CO₂ footprint. I will not stop pushing the boundaries to lead the way in green construction.”

Germany: HeidelbergCement has presented a new business strategy, involving an accelerated climate action plan, called Beyond 2020. Under the Strategy, the company will aim to reduce its specific carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions by 10% to 525kg/t of cement by 2025 from 585kg/t in 2019. Its financial targets over the period are “a significant increase in earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) margin by 300 basis points and return on invested capital (ROIC) to clearly above 8%. The group says that it will target a leverage ratio between 1.5 and 2 times its result from current operations in 2020.

Chief executive officer (CEO) Dominik von Achten said, “We see climate change and digitalisation as the two central challenges of the future for society and for our company. As one of the world's leading building materials producers, we have the ambition and the innovative strength to actively shape this change in a pioneering role. At the same time, we see further optimisation potential in our plants and processes. Ecology and economy are not contradictory. Our new medium-term targets for 2025 illustrate this claim.”