The carbon footprint of concrete is colossal. Every year we would use some 30 billion tons, making it the most abundant rock of the Anthropocene – the age of humanity – which, together with plastic pollution, will allow archaeologists in the distant future to identify traces of our civilization. But the concrete will not only clutter the geological layers: it is also estimated that the annual production of 4 billion tons of cement, its basic ingredient, would represent 8% of global CO emissions2 : to make every ton of cement, we send more than 600 kilos of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Concrete is also tons of too little recycled waste which also has an impact on the environment.
So many reasons to develop new technologies to reduce the pollution of a material that the world does not yet seem ready to replace. News ? Not necessarily. Looking to the distant past could well provide us with recipes for better, more resistant and more durable concrete… and therefore to reduce its impact on the environment. Lessons to take from the great builders that were the ancient Romans? A study which has just appeared in the journal “Science Advances explains to us some of the secrets of the concrete monuments that have survived two millennia.
What exactly is concrete?
Concrete, remember, is a mixture. The basic manufactured product is cement, which from
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