Check out "Performance of CO2-reducing cement based on calcium silicates" linked on Solidia's Releases page for some initial numbers, funded by Solidia. They claim it's similarly durable and strong.
If you let CaO react with CO2, you should get CaCO3, which is basically the Calcite you likely started out with (plus some gravel and sand). There's not really any problem building huge buildings out of limestone or sandstone blocks, in fact that's tried and tested over millenia and evidently very durable, at least as long as there's no acidic rain falling directly on the calcite.
@@amohammed3337 One thing that you have to take into account though is even if the raw new cement is cheaper than Portland cement, the new stuff cures much faster, so you cut down on labor costs in construction.
A point worth making, we don't necesseraly want CO2 to interact with reinforced concrete, it's called carbonatation and it's one of the potential illness of concrete. The carbonatation process increase compressive strength (great!) but lower pH (not cool !) so went the carbonatation front reaches the rebar, the steel is no longer passivated (I'm french, not sure this word is the rigth one, it's not able to rust) and then it will rust and the rust being less dense than steel, it put pressure on the concrete, cracking it and "exploding" potentially. Yeah the concrete is not drying, it's hydrating, and it can take cure submerged in water, as a matter of fact, when we do compression test, we submerged the cylindrical specimen to reduce potential cracking.
Unless the Cement industry finds out and lobbies against it claiming how you'll destroy all the poor cement plant workers jobs. we do plenty of things inefficiently because the out of date and dumb method has a few rich people behind it who make non-political issues political in an effort to not ever be replaced.
Not if you're a construction materials conglomerate, your profits coming out of a dozen of portland cement plants. You'll go to advocate how slag and flyash are the epitome of ecological risks, while you--an ultimate savior--utilize them as dilution material for your product.
Speaking as an inspector who works with concrete very regularly, the hurdle won’t be just the cement industry but the structural engineers and the testing labs. Materials that have vastly different chemistry and curing processes will change the entire process every step of the way. It’s not impossible of course, but there is a HUGE barrier to entry for ANY new material on commercial construction sites. My thoughts are it will take an entire new generation of engineers to design around and design with these new materials, a majority of the old guard are relatively set in their ways. I’ve seen some details on plans that have probably been saved and copied a hundred times over.
We'd need to plant ten trillion trees to offset the amount of carbon already in the atmosphere. 280 parts per million carbon dioxide is the background pre-industrial maximum for the last million years, 350 parts per million is the scientific consensus for upper safe limit, 400 parts per million is the redline for environmental calamity, we're currently at 410 parts per million and climbing by 3 parts per million per year. Shall we start today? e360.yale.edu/digest/planting-1-2-trillion-trees-could-cancel-out-a-decade-of-co2-emissions-scientists-find
True? But like, we don't capture the carbon to make trees, the tree does all the work, there's more than *just* trees, and concrete is a good alternative since it's non-flammable. Note: Asides from trees and concrete, there's limestone (which on its own is a great building material, just that it's heavy to transport, so making it into cement makes more sense if you're not building nearby the quarry) and then there's also bamboo (which, sadly, like trees, is also flammable; and it's a type of grass, not a tree).
@Daniel Meyers Exactly, and fire, mold and aerobic bacteria convert wood to carbon dioxide. Anaerobic bacteria convert the wood into methane - the greater greenhouse gas. Termites produce both carbon dioxide (the termite's respiration) and methane (the termite's gut bacteria). Then transport and processing have to be added. This doesn't even go into preservatives. Most of what is peddled as "green" is the result of questionable accounting practices.
5:27 to this point, from a naive point of view it's surprising that pumping in CO2 and upping calcium carbonate ratios as a result doesn't degrade the concrete given that it's reverting in some sense, at least chemically, back to limestone. Would love some clarification on that.
Limestone is pretty sturdy stuff when used for construction - lots of limestone buildings & pillars made by the Greeks and Romans are still standing today. Concrete was a way to have a lighter, more convenient (no more hauling giant stone blocks up a mountain) material.
@@arnaeri9290 from an equally ignorant point of view except that I did some clay sculpting in high school, if you don't fire the clay when you're done, you could crumble your sculpture to dust no problem, but after it gets fired it gets sturdier, so it's probably a similar principle there?
@@arnaeri9290 Concrete doesn't stick together so strongly because they got it wet. Those ingredients are there for a reason. They chemically bond everything together. The water just makes those chemical reactions possible. Grinding up a big rock into tiny pieces and adding water just gets you mud.
Architecture student here. Concrete is for sure one of the top concerns of sustainable firms right now. I really hope we get some good alternatives, because right now concrete is pretty much a given in 99% of constructions
Check out natural building methods. Cob, Adobe, strawbale are just a few of methods to build sustainable, high performance buildings with little to no footprint. Using locally abundant, cheap natural materials. It's true that they're not as easily scalable and not as suitable for industrial use. But maybe all it needs is a creative architecture student to turn things around 😉
Also an architecture student here;) Kinda doing my Master Thesis on this topic right now^^. wooden buildings produce about 50-70% less CO2, so thats probably the way to go. In Germany about 50% of all houses in existence are built out of concrete, 2018 the part of newly build wooden houses was only 18%. In Norway and Canada the first modern wooden skyscrapers have been built (up to 85m high). Also an option for one or two story buildings is clay (check out house Rauch). Both of the materials are also recyclable unlike concrete which just lands on a landfill.
I must point out that even the most optimistic timeline for this is going to take years if not decades. Civil engineers are very conservative with new tech and with good reason. It can take decades for problems with a process or implementation to crop up, and the result with something as fundamental as concrete would be thousands dead. I am not saying that it will not work, I am saying that any attempt to rush this into use would likely be disastrous.
The George Foreman grill has not put charcoal grill makers out of business. There is a lot of capital tied up in conventional cement work. I wonder if incorporating this tech in the manufacture of a 3-D printed tiny house of cement would be a way two new technologies could lift each other.
Depends on the application. For buildings and bridges you're absolutely right, but for driveways, siding, sidewalks, and dozens of other applications, the danger is negligible and permitting is less onerous.
again, Confencing the creator are not easy, they will be tend to test the power of the their new products and set whole parameters including the quality to match or even better with lower cost than before
@@IceMetalPunk It's actually not too uncommon for startups to work with more established competitors. It happens a lot in information technology and related industries, but what often happens is that the established company will buy a portion of the startup's stock and send advisors to the startup to make sure things go smoothly and everyone profits. For cement, a similar thing could be done and the established company could also argue for licensing and branding rights in the contract. This would let them both enjoy a PR boost as they brag about being such bug supporters of green innovation and let them use the startup's logo or product in some of their own products.
@Vicente Rivera That might actually be a way for the new product to get a foot in the door. Faster curing concrete produces issues when you want to cast it on a construction site, as concrete is often shiped to the site pre-mixed and not mixed on site. Faster curing however would be very interesting for pre-fab concrete parts, as faster curing means, the molds can be opend and used for the next batch faster. Using the new concrete for these parts could intrudice it to the construction industry and build confidence in the material, leading to wider proliferation.
I think the problem is with the clinkering process. It was said in the video that they need less limestone during clinkering. This means that cement companies will need to alter their raw mix design to produce clinker specifically for Solidia's requirements. This is problematic in the sense that: 1. Cement plant kilns usually has a blending silo to store raw meal before the thermal process for clinkering - this will mean a lot of materials will have to be allocated for the test. You also have to take into account the transition mix when going from regular design to new (unless they clean up the silo before the test so you can start from scratch) 2. Clinker for Solidia will have to be segregated so as not to contaminate the regular clinker. 3. The finish grinding mill will have to be run just for the solidia cement so this is another set of lost production and materials for the test, with the cement product to be assigned a different silo so it will not contaminate the current product. All in all, during the industrial run itself, the cement plant will have to commit lost production and a lot of materials and energy already - thats a few million already for the lost production, raw material costs, electrical and thermal energy cost, and manpower just for the trial run. In this case, you will need to do the trial in a cement plant that is not in a sold out market or one that has enough money to spare for the trial.
It comes from burning the limestone in the kiln. Limestone is CaCO3. Upon calcination, CO2 is liberated and exhausted from the kiln system while CaO remains in the system to undergo thermal processes and turn to clinker
Calciumhydroxide is alkaline this property prevents rebar from rusting. Calciumcarbonate is not, so switching to this kind of concrete means we need to change our rebar from steel to something else.
These are cool technologies. We need more research and industry behind improving the materials we use everyday. Reducing waste, using byproducts of other industrial processes, improving installation methods, and making a better end product for things like concrete are valuable in their own right. Using climate change hysteria shouldn't be needed to sell them to the public.
Thank you for doing a cement video, it always annoys me when people say cement when they mean concrete. (Examples include cement truck, cement driveway). Imagine if people referred to a computer as a motherboard.
Factorio expert weighing in. Can verify CO2 production issue with cement production. Four solutions available: patching out in future version, modding out in current version, using CO2 to produce other materials (limited utility, not a lot of demand), or sending off to Flare Stack, preferably equipped with a pair of Green Module 8's.
I suppose you could pair a factory that produces traditional water-cured cement with a factory that produces CO2 cured cement. You then capture the CO2 produced by the traditional cement factory and use it to cure the CO2-cured cement. That way you can still produce traditional cement for any applications the greener stuff isn't suited for or simply hasn't been adequately tested in, while the whole process is carbon negative (when accounting for the carbon absorbed by traditional cement after the fact).
pairing up Industries is the only progress we can make right now: remove waste byproduct from dumping process to be a utility for another industrial purpose; chain byproduct to another industrial scope eliminating dumping into landfills rivers or atmosphere.
I think best avenue for them to get into is precast structures, getting something applied into the field is incredibly time consuming and even more resistant to change. but the fact they are developing the supporting tech to use in field applications is huge, heres hoping I get to work on a job using it!
I work at a large company that produces, among other stuff, cement, we are currently field testing a subsidized technology (LEILAC ) to recapture the CO2 as it is released during the production proces of the clinker. Also a highly promissing technology i feel.
I think that makes more sense for the cement manufacturers as it will not mess up their mix design, no trial runs required, and the end product will be the same so not much concerns for the strength of the cement and ultimately concrete produced
Lots of new, exciting techs out there for construction. Sadly, very few of them are ready for prime time yet, and there's push-back from both sides on many of them. I'm just happy to see that I'm getting to benefit from some of them in my lifetime. W00t for the paper trees.
The major problem for all this is that a lot of construction projects don't rely on pre-casting cement, meaning that if CO2 was to to be harvested off-site, many labourers that handle either the transportation or casting of concrete could be out of work.
This is why we need government funding basic research and funding products to see if they can become viable. Companies are risk averse and aren't going to fund science that will make them obsolete or take a lot of money to figure out.
I work in precast concrete.... something that may not be apparent is all of the engines - diesel and otherwise - that are used in concrete finishing and casting.
Good subject matter. Also, thank you for slowing down your delivery on this one; much easier to listen to and absorb. Keep it up. (The quick cut/fast talk/fire hose delivery is annoying).
The slag additive you mentioned makes horrific blisters on people who work it. I know after pouring out five different Kwik Trip gas stations I had them.
Check out CARBONCURE They are already involved with 100's of locations across the world. They use carbon capture from high emitting resources and use it in the concrete. Used like normal and requires little change in concrete production facilities... so it's past the "valley of death".
Depends on the application. For cost, you can check their partner EP Henry that sells products made with Solidia tech. Initial tests for rebar are good, but take a while for certain applications obviously.
Other alternatives currently being researched include introducing microbes into concrete so they're self-healing, and therefore more durable against cracks. There are also Geopolymer cements which work on an entirely different chemical reaction and emits about 50-90% less CO2 during production. There are lots of factors to overcome when replacing ordinary Portland cement (OPC). Its workability on site, strength, ductility, stickiness, durability, cost of production are some of them. As this topic continues to be researched, more ways of replacing carbon-intensive are coming to light.
In a decade where business and consumers will increasingly be seeking cleaner products, the timing couldn't be better for the secret, low-emissions concrete developed by Queensland construction and materials company Wagners. TOOWOOMBA WELLCAMP AIRPORT www.wagner.com.au/main/our-projects/toowoomba-wellcamp-airport/ Wagners undertook the construction of the jet-capable, Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport and Wellcamp Business Park in 2013. Wagners’ “Earth Friendly Concrete” (EFC) was used for the construction of all heavy duty pavements in the aircraft turning areas as well as a range of other works on the project.The concrete, which has been developed over the past decade and uses no Portland cement, was in 2019 approved for wide use in Germany, opening the door to the rest of Europe.
Thank you for being explicit about your sponsorship. You could have front-loaded that more, but I don't think it was necessary to do so (others' mileage may vary).
kinda illegn not to reveal. frount loaded is better via the argument its less deciptful or somesuch iirc physics girl or minute physics did a piece recently on it
No it isn't. If it's plastic, it's derived from oil. If it's recycled plastic, melting it down would emit pollutants as well, unless they capture it during production, but then we're basically back where we are today. Also, plastic may work for a road surface, but I wouldn't want plastic buildings.
The CO2 is absorption by conventional concretes is a process known as Carbonation. This is a genuine concern for engineers around the world as it has a significant impact on the durability of concrete. Naturally, concrete has a high pH that protects the reinforcing steel bars embedded within it. The process of carbonation reduces the high pH of the concrete, making the reinforcing steel more susceptible to corrosion, which can lead to significant weakening of a structure. I’m extremely curious about the durability of a concrete structure that relies on CO2 as a binding agent.
Sadly this stuff will have to go through 20 years of testing before an engineer will allow it on their projects. Somewhere like India will likely adopt it long before America or most other western nations.
Anybody else ever notice that Kermit & cemet don't mix very well? You _always_ end up with big green lumps! It's _very_ hard. However, I _swear_ that I'll keep on trying your patience. 😆😆😆😆
Seems that it's best use, given it's creation limitations, is likely a substitute for pretension and form cement, where concrete is poured into a mold which has stretched cables within the mold. The fast cure time would be appealing for shorter fabrications time retirements and thereby higher productivity.
Couldn't we work to increase the surface area of cement without comprimising its structural integrity, (for instance using a matrix/matrices or honeycomb structures through the cement with tiny plated openings)? This way the cement we produce will take less product to complete as well as maximize the CO2 it intakes. This structuring might also be more stable than solid cement too...
Pre-cast, maybe, assuming they are simple shapes. You could pour them on the ground and flip them up afterwards. Cast in place tho, you wouldn't be able to pour walls very easily. Between the reinforcement and the tight corners in the forms you would have trouble getting the stone into some places. Basically you'll have large pockets of just cement and sand, if you could even work it into the forms at a reasonable slump. Also would end up creating a lot more tensile stresses in the concrete, so you would need to install more reinforcement. All in all, good idea, but we would have to work on our placement methods.
In some places you could do this, but most of the world has to deal with ice at least some of the time. If water gets in and freezes you can say goodbye to your strength.
I believe this is already done in some form. I think Hoover Dam has miles of pipes running through it with cold water to speed curing. There's so much concrete that it's still curing to this day and would be hundreds of degrees in temp without the piping.
Hank, I wish you would do a follow up on geopolymer cement.....and some history on the creator. Truly fascinating man, and product. The airport in Brisbane Australia including runways, roads, buildings. ..all geopolymer cement with a lifespan that could last for excess of 5,000 years.
You will also enjoy his proof that the pyramids are built with this product at varying degrees of content, and that slipform construction techniques were employed.
I want to see what happens when you make this with carbonated water (like seltzer water). Aerated concrete is a lightweight, precast, foam concrete that usually comes in precast blocks because it requires a large autoclave to cast it. This limits the place that they can be made and the size of cast pieces. A CO2 curing concrete mixed with carbonated water could eliminate the need for gas containment during curing. And, possibly, the result could be lighter while maintaining most of its strength.
I agree that it's a hard problem to solve. But one thing you didn't talk about is the potential of natural building materials like clay and (hydraulic) lime. Those materials and their respective building methods (cob, Adobe, straw baling...) create amazing, high performance buildings made of cheap, abundant and non toxic materials. Limestone cements and plasters even absorb large amounts of co2 during the buildings lifetime. Sure you can't build a skyscraper from clay but a family house you can build without any Cement or steel at all.
As an outsider, there seems no way to "X ray" the concrete.when done. Stopping the re rod from rusting in In the Stone mix is a problem. The rusting of the rerod is probably causing the distruction of the concretee, and the distruction of the tensile strength of the Concrete Beems.
“Have attacked” or “are attacking”? This is something people are working on, as are others. Just because none of them have been completed yet doesn’t mean they aren’t in progress.
I highly suggest you look more into this to see if it's mold resistant weather resistant its strength under stresses, wear resistance and a ton of other things. Because one flaw, just one can kill a ton of people when used in building. So sic show i request you look into this more heavily, and i mean deeply no stone unturned.
I am surprised that there was no mentioning of the properties of the cement, as for example, is it more, equal or less resistant to mechanical stress; heat tolerant; chemically stable at different temperatures (tropics VS cold dry); But then again, I suppose you could just go look it up. Anyway, neat presentation!
In all seriousness, I might see if I can do research on this subject. I'm going to school for environmental engineering but I've done lots of research with concrete. This research could be very valuable
Tip: you can research alternative materials in our waste that contains CaO, Al2O3, Fe2O3, and SiO2 - these four are the main oxides needed for clinker. The recipe for limestone, silica, and iron is adjusted to get the correct amounts for each. If you could find wastes with those, you could reduce the dependence of cement plants in fossil fuels. Carbon capture in the cement stack would also be very valuable.
Hank, you are becoming like the Simon Whistler of the science world.. no matter what YouBube channel I flip to, there you are. Not saying it's a *bad* thing.. you and Simon are both kinda media heroes of mine in the present day.. But, you will NEVER be as sly and cheeky as that other guy ;)
I just visited an old lime kiln (1830's) and those things used soooo much coal. It took about .5 tons of coal to make 1 ton of lime and it would be burning non stop for 3 days.
Yes, the older kilns use so much coal. I believe some has a specific thermal energy consumption in excess of 8000 MJ per ton of clinker. Newer kilns (shorter) kilns with precalciner and a preheater tower maximized the heat produced by the burner. Kiln feed also has lower moisture (raw meal has around 1% compared to slurry which has up to 50% moisture) which necessitates lower energy consumption to convert to clinker. Modern kilns can go around 3200 to 3400 MJ per ton clinker because of these improvements - less than half of what it used to. Old clinker coolers - specifically planetary coolers - also has a very high radiation loss which will result to higher thermal energy consumption.
Ok, you start with calcium carbonate, heat it to get calcium oxide, mix it with water to make concrete, and let it set back to calcium carbonate. Has it not absorbed the same amount of carbon as it released? We’re talking chemistry. It seems that the only excess co2 is that which was released by the combustion used for heat in the first step.
I guess the real question is: how strong is it in comparison, and how long does it last?
Check out "Performance of CO2-reducing cement based on calcium silicates" linked on Solidia's Releases page for some initial numbers, funded by Solidia. They claim it's similarly durable and strong.
That would be important.
If you let CaO react with CO2, you should get CaCO3, which is basically the Calcite you likely started out with (plus some gravel and sand). There's not really any problem building huge buildings out of limestone or sandstone blocks, in fact that's tried and tested over millenia and evidently very durable, at least as long as there's no acidic rain falling directly on the calcite.
And how much does it cost.
@@amohammed3337 One thing that you have to take into account though is even if the raw new cement is cheaper than Portland cement, the new stuff cures much faster, so you cut down on labor costs in construction.
2:44 "Cement has a substantial carbon footprint."
I hate when there are footprints in my cement.
But it’s not set in stone
Yugi: “Pharoh No!”
Pharoh: “I activate The Seal of Orichalcos!”
......
Pharoh: “What have I done?”
@@AceChampElite I see, you are a duelist as well.
concrete*?
You can always open a Chinese theater.
A point worth making, we don't necesseraly want CO2 to interact with reinforced concrete, it's called carbonatation and it's one of the potential illness of concrete. The carbonatation process increase compressive strength (great!) but lower pH (not cool !) so went the carbonatation front reaches the rebar, the steel is no longer passivated (I'm french, not sure this word is the rigth one, it's not able to rust) and then it will rust and the rust being less dense than steel, it put pressure on the concrete, cracking it and "exploding" potentially.
Yeah the concrete is not drying, it's hydrating, and it can take cure submerged in water, as a matter of fact, when we do compression test, we submerged the cylindrical specimen to reduce potential cracking.
Off topic. TH-cam STOP MOVING THE DAMN COMMENT SECTION
I'm on PC right now but HOLY FRICK IM NOT SURPRISED THEY DID IT AGAIN JUST TO SCREW WITH US
Reload the page and then you can add cement related puns.
Literally! I hate this new system!
Lost count on how many times TH-cam tried to fix things that weren't broken!
It acutally is better, but i'm not used to it so i'd rather have the previous one. I just wish they said " Hey we're changing this, do you want it?"
SciShow comment section is basically a mine of *solid* dad jokes
A hard problem, but at least nobody can deny it, since we have concrete evidence for it.
Ever notice that Kermit & cemet don't mix very well?
You _always_ end up with big green lumps! 😆😆😆
(I'm gonna leave now... I'll see myself out)
Digitalhunny
🤣
Karens : Are you challenging me ?!
Olaf Gołąb you’ve just hit ROCK BOTTOM
@@m1l22
Don't take that for *granite.*
My case is *rock solid* and well *grounded.*
What are you gonna do? *Stone* me, *ore* what?
Missed the "set in their ways" joke about the cement industry's reluctance to change.
"New green concrete has cement makers bricking themselves"
I tried coming up with a pun but its hard.
Nice pun friend
Nice pun there mate
Yes very nice
You should try doing while stoned off your rocker
I’m hard...
if the process is cheaper and cuts down building costs it'll catch traction and become a more viable resource much quicker
Possible, but steel is cheaper than lead and guess which one is still in pipes.
@@kbahrt Lead isn't used in modern plumbing, lead pipes are from a period in which copper, plastic, and steel were not cheap or easy to make.
Unless the Cement industry finds out and lobbies against it claiming how you'll destroy all the poor cement plant workers jobs.
we do plenty of things inefficiently because the out of date and dumb method has a few rich people behind it who make non-political issues political in an effort to not ever be replaced.
Not if you're a construction materials conglomerate, your profits coming out of a dozen of portland cement plants. You'll go to advocate how slag and flyash are the epitome of ecological risks, while you--an ultimate savior--utilize them as dilution material for your product.
@@azazelthedark1 right. he tried a quippy response but it made him look dumb af
Enjoying scrolling through the comments to read all the cement puns.
I appreciate that sometimes you know what the comments are going to be about just by reading the title of the video.
In a freak accident, Windows CE, Windows ME, and Windows NT were merged into on operating system. The result ran like a brick.
One of the reasons I love this channel
Yeah, they're pretty concrete...
@@OrigamiMarie Oh you mean Windows10 Ha ha ha ... oh, wait
As a matsci major, learning about cement is actually really fun. You could say it rocks. Unless you prefer reading about polymers.
"Even the hardest concrete never quite sets; and the sun never sweats!" - wise words from Spinal Tap.
Speaking as an inspector who works with concrete very regularly, the hurdle won’t be just the cement industry but the structural engineers and the testing labs. Materials that have vastly different chemistry and curing processes will change the entire process every step of the way. It’s not impossible of course, but there is a HUGE barrier to entry for ANY new material on commercial construction sites. My thoughts are it will take an entire new generation of engineers to design around and design with these new materials, a majority of the old guard are relatively set in their ways. I’ve seen some details on plans that have probably been saved and copied a hundred times over.
Wow, using carbon captured from the environment to create building materials!
Also known as a tree.
We'd need to plant ten trillion trees to offset the amount of carbon already in the atmosphere. 280 parts per million carbon dioxide is the background pre-industrial maximum for the last million years, 350 parts per million is the scientific consensus for upper safe limit, 400 parts per million is the redline for environmental calamity, we're currently at 410 parts per million and climbing by 3 parts per million per year. Shall we start today? e360.yale.edu/digest/planting-1-2-trillion-trees-could-cancel-out-a-decade-of-co2-emissions-scientists-find
Trees are amazing and produce tons of benefits in addition to lumber but one thing they aren’t very good at is producing concrete.
True? But like, we don't capture the carbon to make trees, the tree does all the work, there's more than *just* trees, and concrete is a good alternative since it's non-flammable.
Note: Asides from trees and concrete, there's limestone (which on its own is a great building material, just that it's heavy to transport, so making it into cement makes more sense if you're not building nearby the quarry) and then there's also bamboo (which, sadly, like trees, is also flammable; and it's a type of grass, not a tree).
@Daniel Meyers Exactly, and fire, mold and aerobic bacteria convert wood to carbon dioxide. Anaerobic bacteria convert the wood into methane - the greater greenhouse gas. Termites produce both carbon dioxide (the termite's respiration) and methane (the termite's gut bacteria). Then transport and processing have to be added. This doesn't even go into preservatives. Most of what is peddled as "green" is the result of questionable accounting practices.
@mister clean It _is_ the tallest one, after all. XD
5:27 to this point, from a naive point of view it's surprising that pumping in CO2 and upping calcium carbonate ratios as a result doesn't degrade the concrete given that it's reverting in some sense, at least chemically, back to limestone. Would love some clarification on that.
I wonder if the physical restructuring has something to do with it, like it's creating a cage of limestone around the various aggregates?
Limestone is pretty sturdy stuff when used for construction - lots of limestone buildings & pillars made by the Greeks and Romans are still standing today. Concrete was a way to have a lighter, more convenient (no more hauling giant stone blocks up a mountain) material.
@@muninrob then why don't just crush the limestone to powder then mix it with water? From my ignorant point of view it should have been enough
@@arnaeri9290 from an equally ignorant point of view except that I did some clay sculpting in high school, if you don't fire the clay when you're done, you could crumble your sculpture to dust no problem, but after it gets fired it gets sturdier, so it's probably a similar principle there?
@@arnaeri9290
Concrete doesn't stick together so strongly because they got it wet.
Those ingredients are there for a reason. They chemically bond everything together. The water just makes those chemical reactions possible.
Grinding up a big rock into tiny pieces and adding water just gets you mud.
hank: "The good news, though..."
me: No more puns?
hank: "... *set in stone* "
Architecture student here. Concrete is for sure one of the top concerns of sustainable firms right now. I really hope we get some good alternatives, because right now concrete is pretty much a given in 99% of constructions
Alternate housing indeed isn't that scalable.
Check out natural building methods. Cob, Adobe, strawbale are just a few of methods to build sustainable, high performance buildings with little to no footprint. Using locally abundant, cheap natural materials.
It's true that they're not as easily scalable and not as suitable for industrial use.
But maybe all it needs is a creative architecture student to turn things around 😉
Also an architecture student here;) Kinda doing my Master Thesis on this topic right now^^. wooden buildings produce about 50-70% less CO2, so thats probably the way to go. In Germany about 50% of all houses in existence are built out of concrete, 2018 the part of newly build wooden houses was only 18%. In Norway and Canada the first modern wooden skyscrapers have been built (up to 85m high). Also an option for one or two story buildings is clay (check out house Rauch). Both of the materials are also recyclable unlike concrete which just lands on a landfill.
You get some solid sponsorships on sci show
I must point out that even the most optimistic timeline for this is going to take years if not decades. Civil engineers are very conservative with new tech and with good reason. It can take decades for problems with a process or implementation to crop up, and the result with something as fundamental as concrete would be thousands dead. I am not saying that it will not work, I am saying that any attempt to rush this into use would likely be disastrous.
The George Foreman grill has not put charcoal grill makers out of business. There is a lot of capital tied up in conventional cement work. I wonder if incorporating this tech in the manufacture of a 3-D printed tiny house of cement would be a way two new technologies could lift each other.
@@thomashughes_teh L I F T
Thomas Hughes I’m not sure that’s a very apt comparison.
Depends on the application. For buildings and bridges you're absolutely right, but for driveways, siding, sidewalks, and dozens of other applications, the danger is negligible and permitting is less onerous.
@@PajamaMan44 The George can run on zero carbon footprint renewable energy. What is your more apt comparison?
They could pair that new solidia technology with a classic Portland cement factory in order to use its CO2 emission in their process.
again, Confencing the creator are not easy, they will be tend to test the power of the their new products and set whole parameters including the quality to match or even better with lower cost than before
Why would a Portland cement company team up with a competitor?
@@IceMetalPunk It's actually not too uncommon for startups to work with more established competitors. It happens a lot in information technology and related industries, but what often happens is that the established company will buy a portion of the startup's stock and send advisors to the startup to make sure things go smoothly and everyone profits. For cement, a similar thing could be done and the established company could also argue for licensing and branding rights in the contract. This would let them both enjoy a PR boost as they brag about being such bug supporters of green innovation and let them use the startup's logo or product in some of their own products.
@Vicente Rivera
That might actually be a way for the new product to get a foot in the door.
Faster curing concrete produces issues when you want to cast it on a construction site, as concrete is often shiped to the site pre-mixed and not mixed on site.
Faster curing however would be very interesting for pre-fab concrete parts, as faster curing means, the molds can be opend and used for the next batch faster.
Using the new concrete for these parts could intrudice it to the construction industry and build confidence in the material, leading to wider proliferation.
I think the problem is with the clinkering process. It was said in the video that they need less limestone during clinkering. This means that cement companies will need to alter their raw mix design to produce clinker specifically for Solidia's requirements. This is problematic in the sense that:
1. Cement plant kilns usually has a blending silo to store raw meal before the thermal process for clinkering - this will mean a lot of materials will have to be allocated for the test. You also have to take into account the transition mix when going from regular design to new (unless they clean up the silo before the test so you can start from scratch)
2. Clinker for Solidia will have to be segregated so as not to contaminate the regular clinker.
3. The finish grinding mill will have to be run just for the solidia cement so this is another set of lost production and materials for the test, with the cement product to be assigned a different silo so it will not contaminate the current product.
All in all, during the industrial run itself, the cement plant will have to commit lost production and a lot of materials and energy already - thats a few million already for the lost production, raw material costs, electrical and thermal energy cost, and manpower just for the trial run. In this case, you will need to do the trial in a cement plant that is not in a sold out market or one that has enough money to spare for the trial.
43% is impressive, even if optimistic.
This episode will *cement* itself as one of the punniest episodes in SciShow history. Hank Green needs a concrete cell at the Punitentiary for this.
I guess you can say that's a hard problem to fix, another solid video hank 😁
Wow, I had no idea that cement had a sizeable carbon footprint. Thanks for making me aware!
It comes from burning the limestone in the kiln. Limestone is CaCO3. Upon calcination, CO2 is liberated and exhausted from the kiln system while CaO remains in the system to undergo thermal processes and turn to clinker
Calciumhydroxide is alkaline this property prevents rebar from rusting. Calciumcarbonate is not, so switching to this kind of concrete means we need to change our rebar from steel to something else.
Calciumcarbonate is alkaline, too, just less so. The carbonate ion is a base.
Thanks, very good, everyone here in class of 8a loves it especially Oliver!
It does seem the cement issue is a really hard problem to crack
What??? I would of never even thought to put that on list of what i thought is harming our earth.
Good job. Pretty interesting video
These are cool technologies. We need more research and industry behind improving the materials we use everyday. Reducing waste, using byproducts of other industrial processes, improving installation methods, and making a better end product for things like concrete are valuable in their own right. Using climate change hysteria shouldn't be needed to sell them to the public.
Agreed. ;-)
First time I see a Bill Gates sponsorship to this channel.
First time I've seen a Bill Gates sponsorship on any channel, unless Khan Academy still counts as merely a channel.
They have been sponsored by Bill Gates for years he and Hank are colleagues.
The Bill Gates foundation is made of concrete
@ *lajya01*
🤣
5:20 i guess the cement industry is pretty rock solid
0:45
Channelling the Professor Farnsworth energy
Thanks all at SciShow. Big fan for a long time, especially since you all check and cite your sources. Stay safe everyone!
Thank you for doing a cement video, it always annoys me when people say cement when they mean concrete. (Examples include cement truck, cement driveway). Imagine if people referred to a computer as a motherboard.
Factorio expert weighing in. Can verify CO2 production issue with cement production. Four solutions available: patching out in future version, modding out in current version, using CO2 to produce other materials (limited utility, not a lot of demand), or sending off to Flare Stack, preferably equipped with a pair of Green Module 8's.
I suppose you could pair a factory that produces traditional water-cured cement with a factory that produces CO2 cured cement. You then capture the CO2 produced by the traditional cement factory and use it to cure the CO2-cured cement. That way you can still produce traditional cement for any applications the greener stuff isn't suited for or simply hasn't been adequately tested in, while the whole process is carbon negative (when accounting for the carbon absorbed by traditional cement after the fact).
That set in stone line was solid
pairing up Industries is the only progress we can make right now: remove waste byproduct from dumping process to be a utility for another industrial purpose; chain byproduct to another industrial scope eliminating dumping into landfills rivers or atmosphere.
I think best avenue for them to get into is precast structures, getting something applied into the field is incredibly time consuming and even more resistant to change. but the fact they are developing the supporting tech to use in field applications is huge, heres hoping I get to work on a job using it!
They do precast already with their partner EP Henry. :-)
Oh the amount of puns that are in this video is glorious
Yeah the final One Is the Vestone when he Say Who Is payng for It 🤣😂
This man is the Carl Azus of science
I work at a large company that produces, among other stuff, cement, we are currently field testing a subsidized technology (LEILAC ) to recapture the CO2 as it is released during the production proces of the clinker. Also a highly promissing technology i feel.
I think that makes more sense for the cement manufacturers as it will not mess up their mix design, no trial runs required, and the end product will be the same so not much concerns for the strength of the cement and ultimately concrete produced
I loved this episode! Thank you!
We need more people like Bill
Lots of new, exciting techs out there for construction. Sadly, very few of them are ready for prime time yet, and there's push-back from both sides on many of them. I'm just happy to see that I'm getting to benefit from some of them in my lifetime. W00t for the paper trees.
The major problem for all this is that a lot of construction projects don't rely on pre-casting cement, meaning that if CO2 was to to be harvested off-site, many labourers that handle either the transportation or casting of concrete could be out of work.
This is why we need government funding basic research and funding products to see if they can become viable. Companies are risk averse and aren't going to fund science that will make them obsolete or take a lot of money to figure out.
🎶You put the lime in the con-crete and break it all up....🎵
(as the background singer, repeats) 🎶 Fin-ish-er🎶
cement also has a problem with sand when making concrete; its running out
I work in precast concrete.... something that may not be apparent is all of the engines - diesel and otherwise - that are used in concrete finishing and casting.
Good subject matter. Also, thank you for slowing down your delivery on this one; much easier to listen to and absorb. Keep it up. (The quick cut/fast talk/fire hose delivery is annoying).
List of things you should *not* do:
* Say cement when you’re talking about concrete
* Say concrete when you’re talking about cement
* Do drugs
*watch welding arc
As a structural engineer it makes me cringe every time they get it wrong.
Play with azidoazide azide
Once got corrected by an engineer when I confused the two. He was not happy.
*overdose on dihydrogen monoxide
The slag additive you mentioned makes horrific blisters on people who work it. I know after pouring out five different Kwik Trip gas stations I had them.
Okay who let the Minute Earth writers author a SciShow video.
You should do an episode on hempcrete and other green building materials
Check out CARBONCURE
They are already involved with 100's of locations across the world.
They use carbon capture from high emitting resources and use it in the concrete.
Used like normal and requires little change in concrete production facilities... so it's past the "valley of death".
It is a technology that cement plants really will prefer as it will not mess up with their normal processes.
So cool! Ears are opening.
They recently fixed a road by my location, now it's like off roading which is hard for a lot of city cars...
How strong will it be? how resistant to oxygen (rusting rebars)? Cost?
Depends on the application. For cost, you can check their partner EP Henry that sells products made with Solidia tech. Initial tests for rebar are good, but take a while for certain applications obviously.
This comment section really has some hard to laugh at jokes.
The evidence is concrete, just look at these dumb stack of bricks
Thanks Solidia commercial, very cool
I had 7 letters at the end of the scrabble game. ERCLKNI. Clinker was right there and I had no idea it was a word. I lost. Thanks SciShow.....
Other alternatives currently being researched include introducing microbes into concrete so they're self-healing, and therefore more durable against cracks. There are also Geopolymer cements which work on an entirely different chemical reaction and emits about 50-90% less CO2 during production. There are lots of factors to overcome when replacing ordinary Portland cement (OPC). Its workability on site, strength, ductility, stickiness, durability, cost of production are some of them. As this topic continues to be researched, more ways of replacing carbon-intensive are coming to light.
In a decade where business and consumers will increasingly be seeking cleaner products, the timing couldn't be better for the secret, low-emissions concrete developed by Queensland construction and materials company Wagners.
TOOWOOMBA WELLCAMP AIRPORT
www.wagner.com.au/main/our-projects/toowoomba-wellcamp-airport/
Wagners undertook the construction of the jet-capable, Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport and Wellcamp Business Park in 2013.
Wagners’ “Earth Friendly Concrete” (EFC) was used for the construction of all heavy duty pavements in the aircraft turning areas as well as a range of other works on the project.The concrete, which has been developed over the past decade and uses no Portland cement, was in 2019 approved for wide use in Germany, opening the door to the rest of Europe.
These daily videos are getting me through quarantine ngl
Well you can thank's Bill for both seem 😉
Wow! How nice you explained!
Thank you for being explicit about your sponsorship. You could have front-loaded that more, but I don't think it was necessary to do so (others' mileage may vary).
kinda illegn not to reveal. frount loaded is better via the argument its less deciptful or somesuch iirc physics girl or minute physics did a piece recently on it
Shouldn't it make sense that economists consider material exchange between us and the environment as a business entity and try to balance that?
We can use plastic to make our roads! There's this video on the internet that shows the construction of
plastic roads! It's actually echo friendly!
No it isn't. If it's plastic, it's derived from oil. If it's recycled plastic, melting it down would emit pollutants as well, unless they capture it during production, but then we're basically back where we are today. Also, plastic may work for a road surface, but I wouldn't want plastic buildings.
4:36 was the funniest installation pic looks like a hot saw for removal also the may want to use some water when cutting if not at least a dust mask
The CO2 is absorption by conventional concretes is a process known as Carbonation. This is a genuine concern for engineers around the world as it has a significant impact on the durability of concrete. Naturally, concrete has a high pH that protects the reinforcing steel bars embedded within it. The process of carbonation reduces the high pH of the concrete, making the reinforcing steel more susceptible to corrosion, which can lead to significant weakening of a structure. I’m extremely curious about the durability of a concrete structure that relies on CO2 as a binding agent.
Good luck
Sadly this stuff will have to go through 20 years of testing before an engineer will allow it on their projects. Somewhere like India will likely adopt it long before America or most other western nations.
Sounds like a solid idea.
Haha that title, I giggled...
And the sponsor?
@ *Nicola Pelos*
The sponsor is Nikola Tesla.
Is the process that traditional concrete goes through where it is pulling CO2 back into itself also reducing its effectiveness/strength?
No, Actually quite the contrary. Concrete gets tougher as it ages.
I saw a documentary on it, it's very expensive and only scalable if a cement mega-corp adopts it as it's a complex process to manufacture.
Not that much more expensive and they're already partnered with Cement megacorp Lafarge Holcim.
I heard adding retired wind turbine blades to cement is amazingly strong.
Anybody else ever notice that Kermit & cemet don't mix very well? You _always_ end up with big green lumps!
It's _very_ hard. However, I _swear_ that I'll keep on trying your patience. 😆😆😆😆
Seems that it's best use, given it's creation limitations, is likely a substitute for pretension and form cement, where concrete is poured into a mold which has stretched cables within the mold. The fast cure time would be appealing for shorter fabrications time retirements and thereby higher productivity.
Great title
Couldn't we work to increase the surface area of cement without comprimising its structural integrity, (for instance using a matrix/matrices or honeycomb structures through the cement with tiny plated openings)?
This way the cement we produce will take less product to complete as well as maximize the CO2 it intakes. This structuring might also be more stable than solid cement too...
Now this is thinking with engineering. I don't think this is practical, given how cement is used, but that's not to say it's a bad idea in theory.
Pre-cast, maybe, assuming they are simple shapes. You could pour them on the ground and flip them up afterwards. Cast in place tho, you wouldn't be able to pour walls very easily. Between the reinforcement and the tight corners in the forms you would have trouble getting the stone into some places. Basically you'll have large pockets of just cement and sand, if you could even work it into the forms at a reasonable slump. Also would end up creating a lot more tensile stresses in the concrete, so you would need to install more reinforcement. All in all, good idea, but we would have to work on our placement methods.
In some places you could do this, but most of the world has to deal with ice at least some of the time. If water gets in and freezes you can say goodbye to your strength.
I believe this is already done in some form. I think Hoover Dam has miles of pipes running through it with cold water to speed curing. There's so much concrete that it's still curing to this day and would be hundreds of degrees in temp without the piping.
Hank, I wish you would do a follow up on geopolymer cement.....and some history on the creator. Truly fascinating man, and product. The airport in Brisbane Australia including runways, roads, buildings. ..all geopolymer cement with a lifespan that could last for excess of 5,000 years.
You will also enjoy his proof that the pyramids are built with this product at varying degrees of content, and that slipform construction techniques were employed.
Can you do a video on the valley of death? That sounds pretty cool
I want to see what happens when you make this with carbonated water (like seltzer water).
Aerated concrete is a lightweight, precast, foam concrete that usually comes in precast blocks because it requires a large autoclave to cast it. This limits the place that they can be made and the size of cast pieces.
A CO2 curing concrete mixed with carbonated water could eliminate the need for gas containment during curing. And, possibly, the result could be lighter while maintaining most of its strength.
I agree that it's a hard problem to solve. But one thing you didn't talk about is the potential of natural building materials like clay and (hydraulic) lime.
Those materials and their respective building methods (cob, Adobe, straw baling...) create amazing, high performance buildings made of cheap, abundant and non toxic materials. Limestone cements and plasters even absorb large amounts of co2 during the buildings lifetime.
Sure you can't build a skyscraper from clay but a family house you can build without any Cement or steel at all.
Eyyyyy, thanks Bill for giving science some bills
As an outsider, there seems no way to "X ray" the concrete.when done. Stopping the re rod from rusting in In the Stone mix is a problem. The rusting of the rerod is probably causing the distruction of the concretee, and the distruction of the tensile strength of the Concrete Beems.
We keep talking about "attacking this problem from all fronts." But I can't think of any front we have really attacked! Wtf humanity
“Have attacked” or “are attacking”? This is something people are working on, as are others. Just because none of them have been completed yet doesn’t mean they aren’t in progress.
People love flying coast to coast visiting friends.
@@drdca8263 such as?
This sounds great!
I highly suggest you look more into this to see if it's mold resistant weather resistant its strength under stresses, wear resistance and a ton of other things. Because one flaw, just one can kill a ton of people when used in building. So sic show i request you look into this more heavily, and i mean deeply no stone unturned.
So, the buildings that release CO2 at the start absorb CO2 over time, will the buildings that absorb CO2 at the start release CO2 over time?
I am surprised that there was no mentioning of the properties of the cement, as for example, is it more, equal or less resistant to mechanical stress; heat tolerant; chemically stable at different temperatures (tropics VS cold dry); But then again, I suppose you could just go look it up. Anyway, neat presentation!
In all seriousness, I might see if I can do research on this subject. I'm going to school for environmental engineering but I've done lots of research with concrete. This research could be very valuable
Tip: you can research alternative materials in our waste that contains CaO, Al2O3, Fe2O3, and SiO2 - these four are the main oxides needed for clinker. The recipe for limestone, silica, and iron is adjusted to get the correct amounts for each. If you could find wastes with those, you could reduce the dependence of cement plants in fossil fuels. Carbon capture in the cement stack would also be very valuable.
Hank, you are becoming like the Simon Whistler of the science world.. no matter what YouBube channel I flip to, there you are.
Not saying it's a *bad* thing.. you and Simon are both kinda media heroes of mine in the present day..
But, you will NEVER be as sly and cheeky as that other guy ;)
procrastinating on chem homework by watching sci-sho ✊👊💪👏👌🅱️😤👌💯
edit: finished chem 15 minutes before midnight...
we take those ✊👊💪👏👌🅱️😤👌💯
I just visited an old lime kiln (1830's) and those things used soooo much coal. It took about .5 tons of coal to make 1 ton of lime and it would be burning non stop for 3 days.
Yes, the older kilns use so much coal. I believe some has a specific thermal energy consumption in excess of 8000 MJ per ton of clinker. Newer kilns (shorter) kilns with precalciner and a preheater tower maximized the heat produced by the burner. Kiln feed also has lower moisture (raw meal has around 1% compared to slurry which has up to 50% moisture) which necessitates lower energy consumption to convert to clinker. Modern kilns can go around 3200 to 3400 MJ per ton clinker because of these improvements - less than half of what it used to.
Old clinker coolers - specifically planetary coolers - also has a very high radiation loss which will result to higher thermal energy consumption.
Ok, you start with calcium carbonate, heat it to get calcium oxide, mix it with water to make concrete, and let it set back to calcium carbonate. Has it not absorbed the same amount of carbon as it released? We’re talking chemistry. It seems that the only excess co2 is that which was released by the combustion used for heat in the first step.
"Cement, a really HARD problem"
Congrats on understanding the title