Washington, D.C. — As policymakers around the world work to reduce carbon emissions, it is essential they address the second-most widely used material after water: concrete. The cement and concrete industry is a massive contributor to climate change, responsible for 8 percent of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions worldwide.
A new report from the Center for American Progress explains how dozens of companies have begun investing in new low-emission cement and concrete manufacturing technologies. In the United States, the Department of Energy recently provided $1.6 billion for several cement and concrete decarbonization projects that will cut a total of 4 million metric tons of CO2 emissions annually. These grants were a part of a program funded by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act.
Globally, networks of concrete producers have committed to shared decarbonization goals. These groups include the Decarbonized Cement and Concrete Alliance (DC2) in the United States, the Alliance for Low-Carbon Cement and Concrete in Europe, and the Global Cement and Concrete Association, which represents 80 percent of the global cement industry outside of China.
To keep up this progress, the report recommends the following:
- Policymakers should enact and expand policies to reduce emissions from cement and concrete, including public procurement policies such as “Buy Clean,” tax policies that incentivize clean materials, and standards for carbon intensity or embodied emissions of cement products.
- The federal government should continue to invest in new zero-emission technologies, including carbon capture and storage (CCS) to cut emissions at existing facilities in the short term. For low-income countries where CCS presents a cost barrier, the United States should support the adoption of limestone calcined clay cement (LC3) through collaborative international financing and the utilization of multilateral platforms to encourage technical capacity support and rapid technology deployment.
“The climate crisis cannot be solved without eradicating emissions from heavy manufactured goods such as cement,” said Jamie Friedman, policy analyst on the Domestic Climate team at CAP and author of the report. “It is time to invest more and push for deeper ambition from countries and companies around the world to rapidly reduce emissions from the cement and concrete sector.”
Read the report: “Cement and Concrete Companies Leading the Net-Zero Transition” by Jamie Friedman
For more information or to speak with an expert, please contact Sam Hananel at [email protected].