At its Spring convention in Orlando, Florida, USA, the American Concrete Institute (ACI) announced the establishment of NEU: An ACI Center of Excellence for Carbon Neutral Concrete.
NEU intends to work with partners around the world to advance research, education, awareness, and adoption of carbon-neutral materials and technologies in the industry.
NEU, headquartered at ACI Headquarters in Farmington Hills, Michigan, USA, will focus on transforming the concrete industry into a proactive, unified group actively engaged in developing and employing both existing and new technologies to reduce the concrete industry’s carbon footprint.
The ACI Board of Directors has approved funding for staffing and initial projects, including research to identify technologies with the potential to significantly reduce concrete’s carbon footprint.
Technology acceleration, coordination with ACI committees, technology transfer and professional development, and technology assessment and validation are some of the other core functions.
Baker Concrete, Inc. is also announced as the center’s initial member by NEU.
Baker Concrete is the nation’s largest concrete contractor, specializing in pre-construction, construction, and project management.
They have over 5,500 employees in the United States, Canada, and the Caribbean and specializes in civil, commercial, industrial, institutional, multi-family residential, and mission-critical buildings.
“NEU envisions a concrete industry where all stakeholders have access to technologies and the knowledge needed to effectively and safely produce and place carbon neutral concrete and concrete products,” said Andrea Schokker, Executive Director of NEU.
“Concrete plays a major role in a sustainable future and collaboration with members worldwide is critical to developing a comprehensive plan to help make the concrete industry carbon neutral by 2050.”
The American Concrete Institute has been bringing together the industry’s brightest minds to advance sustainability in the concrete industry for more than a decade.
NEU: ACI Center of Excellence for Carbon Neutral Concrete is uniquely positioned to serve as a catalyst in incorporating ACI’s breadth of knowledge into the further acceleration of carbon-neutral concrete in the built environment, given ACI’s stature as a standards-developing institution and one of the world’s largest sources of consensus-based information on all aspects of concrete construction.
