Resources
BPE’s curated list of useful resources
Ground-Glass Pozzolan
Members of ASTM Subcommittee C09.24 summarize industry context behind new ASTM standard specification
Practical requirements for the composition of concrete that maintains adequate strength and durability for the intended application and at the same time reduces greenhouse gas emissions
The City of Portland’s 2016 Sustainable Supply Chain Analysis identified construction services as the top spend category contributing to the City’s supply chain greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Within construction services, concrete is one of the most GHG-intensive materials typically used on City construction projects. As a result, in 2019, after gathering both internal and external stakeholder input, the City established its Low Carbon Concrete Initiative to reduce the overall carbon intensity of the concrete mixes used on City projects.
The Carbon Smart Materials Palette contains an attribute-based approach to embodied carbon reductions in the built environment. It identifies key attributes that contribute to a material’s embodied carbon impact, and offers guidelines and options for emissions reductions. The Carbon Smart Materials Palette is designed to support and complement Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs) and Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs), while providing highly impactful guidelines for low/no carbon material selections and specifications.
To reduce emissions from the decarbonization process, the crucial strategy is to change the composition of cement. Conventional clinker can be partially substituted for alternative materials that include volcanic ash, certain clays, finely ground limestone, ground bottle glass, and industrial waste products—namely blast furnace slag (from manufacturing iron) and fly ash (from burning coal). These materials leapfrog the most carbon-emitting, energy-intensive step in the cement production process.
Photo Credit: Praveenvatsa / CC BY-SA
The mission of the SE 2050 Commitment is to support the SE 2050 Challenge and transform the practice of structural engineering in a way that is holistic, firm-wide, project based, and data-driven. By prioritizing reduction of embodied carbon, through the use of less and/or less impactful structural materials, participating firms can more easily work toward net zero embodied carbon structural systems by 2050.
Glass is found in municipal solid waste (MSW), primarily in the form of containers such as beer and soft drink bottles; wine and liquor bottles; and bottles and jars for food, cosmetics and other products. Although most of the data is on glass containers, this analysis also considers glass materials in durable goods like furniture, appliances and consumer electronics.
The inconsistent supply of fly ash and relatively high cost of slag as supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) in the Northeastern United States is of concern to the concrete industry. Fly ash is a by-product from coal-burning plants that are shutting down or converting to natural gas, and slag is a residue from steel production mainly outside of the United States. With the goal of contributing significantly to the implementation of sustainable high performance concrete, this study focuses on the evaluation of mixture designs using recycled post-consumer glass as SCM for concrete, for three mixtures with 20, 30, and 40% glass pozzolan as cement replacements, as well as two other comparable mixtures with 30% fly ash and 40% slag.
Recent studies have shown promising potential for using Glass Pozzolan (GP) as an alternative supplementary cementitious material (SCM) due to the scarcity of fly ash and slag in the United States. However, comprehensive studies on the freeze–thaw (FT) resistance and air void system of mixtures containing GP are lacking. Therefore, this study aimed to evaluate GP’s effect on FT resistance and characterize mixtures with different GP contents, both macro- and microscopically.
Due to climate change, air temperatures will rise dramatically over the next century—especially in urban areas. The City of Boston, for instance, predicts that by 2050 its average summer air temperature could increase by as much as 7 °F. One way for cities to mitigate these temperature changes is by increasing the reflectivity of pavements, which are one of the most abundant urban surfaces. In this topic summary, CSHub researchers explain how an increase in pavement reflectivity could offer substantial benefits, even reducing the frequency of heatwaves by 40% across U.S. urban areas.
