Problem:

Cement production is a major source of CO2 in the world:  5 – 7% of total emissions.

Solution:

Store carbon IN the concrete.

For almost a decade, Ifsttar (French Institute for Science and Technology in Transportation, Planning and Networks) has been searching for a method to store CO2 by the carbonation of recycled concrete.

Once the Accelerated Carbonation of Recycled Concrete Aggregates (ACRAC) project ended in 2013, five years later a new project was launched called FastCarb.

In this, Ifsttar has been working with IREX (Institute for Applied Research and Experimentation in Civil Engineering) and MTES (Ministry of Ecological and Solidarity Transition).

The aim of FastCarb is to store CO2 in an accelerated manner, to improve the quality of these aggregates by blocking porosity and ultimately to reduce the CO2 impact of concrete in the structures.

This would recover about 20% of the CO2 initially released during the manufacture of a given concrete, i.e. 88-132 lb per cubic ft (40 to 60 kg per m³).

Discover Solution 64: carbon capture by seaweed

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