Taken individually, coal ash and excess carbon dioxide are harmful pollutants. Combined in just the right way, they form a durable, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly building material.
Taken individually, coal ash and excess carbon dioxide are harmful pollutants. Combined in just the right way, they form a durable, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly building material.
University of Wisconsin–Madison spinoff Alithic is leveraging this unique formula to turn waste streams from liabilities into profits, producing a key ingredient of concrete, the most abundant manufactured product in the world.
Based on a discovery by engineering professor Bu Wang, Alithic uses chemical reactions to pull carbon dioxide from the air and mix it with industrial wastes like coal ash, generating a mineral product — known as supplementary cementitious material, or SCM — that can be substituted for traditional Portland cement, one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions.
Read more at: University of Wisconsin–Madison
Research engineer Casey Jones inspects a drying belt at Alithic's demonstration plant in Madison, which combines carbon dioxide from the atmosphere with ash and other industrial wastes to make a low-cost, carbon-negative building material. (Photo Credit: Chris Hubbuch/Wisconsin Energy Institute)
