Carbon Removal Mitigates Climate Change

We’re proud to partner with CarbonCure Technologies, who was highlighted in a recent CNBC story about the growing demand for carbon removal to mitigate climate change. The CNBC crew filmed this segment with our Central Concrete team in San Jose, CA, to see the technology in action. CarbonCure injects captured CO2 into concrete mixes, which permanently stores the CO2, and has the added benefit of making the concrete stronger. Increased strength means concrete producers can use less cement in their mixes, which helps make the industrial process greener.

Here is what CNBC had to say:

Canadian company CarbonCure has a different approach. Unlike Climeworks and Charm, CarbonCure is putting carbon dioxide to use by injecting it into concrete mixes, which permanently stores the CO2, and has the added benefit of making the concrete stronger.

“The CO2 is injected into concrete and it’s reacting with the cement as it’s being batched. And a chemical reaction occurs where the calcium reacts with the CO2 to form a mineral,” Robert Niven, CarbonCure founder and CEO explained. “Why that reaction matters is it’s actually increasing the strength of concrete.”

WATCH THE VIDEO

That increased strength means concrete producers can use less cement in their mixes, which helps make the industrial process greener. Stripe also was its first customer, and now others like Shopify, Mapbox and Zendesk are on board.

Right now, CarbonCure’s concrete producer partners source CO2 from large industrial facilities like ethanol plants or refineries, where it’s captured from smokestacks. That means that CarbonCure isn’t removing CO2, but rather it’s preventing new emissions from nearly 600 plants worldwide.

But the company is starting to get involved with carbon removal through a Department of Energy-funded partnership with California-based direct air capture company CarbonCapture.