2024-01-04 04:45:10
By the time you read this article – regarding four minutes – some 45,600 cubic meters of concrete will have been poured worldwide. According to a count from the French Building Federation, nearly 190 cubic meters of concrete are used every second on the planet, or nearly 6 billion cubic meters per year. Which makes it the most manipulated manufactured material on Earth and the second most consumed substance, behind water but ahead of oil.
These dizzying figures illustrate the crucial importance of decarbonization of the cement-concrete industrial sector to envisage a real reduction in greenhouse gas emissions on an international scale. It alone represents 7% to 8% of global greenhouse gas emissions. And production continues to increase, in particular because of Chinese and Indian demands: global emissions caused by cement have doubled over the last twenty years, and the International Energy Agency anticipates a possible increase of 12%. to 23% by 2050.
At the beginning of December 2023, several cement plants installed in the Paris region, in Maine-et-Loire or in Eure, were once once more the target of demonstrations by environmental organizations denouncing their climate impact.
In everyday language, cement and concrete are often synonymous: cement is one of the constituents of concrete, obtained from a mixture of limestone and clay; concrete is the construction material made from water, sand, gravel, and therefore cement, which acts as glue in the composition.
Manufacturing cement releases a lot of greenhouse gases: firstly because the firing of limestone and clay is carried out in kilns at 1,400°C powered by fuels; then because this cooking causes a chemical reaction that emits a lot of CO2 and which allows the formation of clinker, the key component of traditional cement.
In France, cement production alone represents 12.5% of greenhouse gas emissions from all industrial sectors, recalls the NGO Réseau Action Climat. Only five companies share 95% of the market: LafargeHolcim, Calcia (Heidelberg group), Eqiom, Vicat and Imerys. Among the list of the fifty industrial sites emitting the most CO2 established by public authorities, 21 are cement plants. The decarbonization of French industry will therefore not take place without that of cement and concrete.
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