Wednesday 18 November 2020

‘Cracks in cement industry’s CO2 response’

The Financial Times writes that producers of cement – of which LafargeHolcim, parent of Aggregate Industries, is the world’s largest – are “moving too slowly” in adoption of greener methods: 
If the cement industry were a country, it would be the third-largest source of CO2 emissions, behind China and the US, accounting for about 8 per cent of the annual total. 
While the sector’s carbon intensity — the average amount of CO2 gas per tonne of output — has fallen by 18 per cent since 1990, gross emissions increased by roughly half over the same period, according to the UK think-tank Chatham House. If a full-blown climate catastrophe is to be avoided, cement is one area of the economy that will have to shrink its carbon footprint the most.