New concrete reduces CO2 emissions in the construction industry
The Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (Empa) and Omya are working together to further develop their concrete with up to 70 per cent less clinker. It is being tested in the new NEST unit Beyond.Zero. Omya is contributing its expertise as a specialist in industrial minerals.
Omya is a new partner in NEST, the modular research and innovation building of Empa and Eawag in Dübendorf. In the Beyond.Zero unit, which has been based there since the beginning of 2024, they want to test a cement-reduced concrete that they developed in a joint research project, according to a statement from Empa.
Omya contributed its expertise as a globally active specialist in industrial materials. “The fact that we can now jointly develop sustainable building materials and test them directly in NEST under real conditions accelerates the transfer of innovations into climate-friendly construction methods,” said Empa Director Tanja Zimmermann.
This innovative building material replaces up to 70 per cent of its clinker content with natural minerals. As Empa explains, this significantly reduces its CO2 footprint. “For a new type of concrete to be widely accepted, it needs to be tested in practice,” Empa researcher Mateusz Wyrzyklowski from Empa’s Concrete and Asphalt department is quoted as saying. “By using it in the NEST Beyond.Zero unit, we can comprehensively validate our cement-reduced concrete: from processing to durability.”
The aim is a building material “that not only fulfils the ecological requirements, but also impresses in terms of workability, mechanical properties, volume stability and durability,” says Empa. The Beyond.Zero unit goes beyond the net zero target in construction. It pursues the vision that buildings can serve as carbon sinks in the future – in other words, they will have a negative CO2 balance on balance. The construction sector currently accounts for around 28 per cent of CO2 emissions in Switzerland.