CO₂ capture from cement manufacture and reuse in concrete.

A technology has been developed that utilizes CO₂ in concrete curing to improve the concrete properties. This process has been commercialized and is in use in over 50 ready mix and concrete product sites across the United States and Canada. At the current time ready mix and concrete product companies are using commercial, food grade CO₂ at a high cost. The long term objective is to extract CO₂ from cement plants and then utilize that same CO₂ in ready mix concrete and concrete products made with the cement that produced the CO₂, thus closing the loop. The cryogenic capture technology has already been trialed at one US cement plant.
This paper discusses the two technologies; CO₂ usage in concrete curing and the cryogenic capture of CO₂ from a cement plant exhaust gas stream. The future of both technologies and the consequences for the cement and concrete industries are explored further in the paper.

Author: J. Kline, C. Kline

Section: Ecology and safety

Keywords: carbon capture, carbon utilization, emissions, cement, concrete.