Concrete Zero shares the journey we have been on as an industry. We have already begun our transition to lower-carbon fuel sources, carbon-reduced cements, and clean technologies. Cement-based materials—including ready mixed, precast and masonry concrete—have also been implementing carbon reductions in their product composition and manufacturing processes. And the industry has been on the leading edge of transparently disclosing and verifying carbon reductions. Our Action Plan lays the foundation for what we will do next and our role in delivering solutions to climate change.
The 4th Edition of the Concrete Design Handbook, the premier guide for concrete design in Canada, covers many aspects of the structural design of conventionally reinforced and prestressed concrete buildings. Written by the members of the CSA A23.3 Technical Committee, it offers a comprehensive analysis of the CSA Group standard A23.3-14, Design of concrete structures, and addresses the design of reinforced concrete structural elements in accordance with the Standard. The Concrete Design Handbook also includes a complete copy of the CSA Group A23.3-14 design standard, and the Explanatory Notes to the Standard.
The Concrete Pavements: Key Technical Resources Directory contains the best technical resources and references available to support the designing, planning and installation of concrete pavements and roads. It has been produced by the Cement Association of Canada for the sole purpose of ensuring that concrete roads and pavement continue to deliver best in class performance for those who build them, use them and pay for them.
This book presents the properties of concrete as required in concrete construction, including strength, durability, sustainability, versatility, and aesthetics. All concrete ingredients (cementitious materials, water, aggregates, chemical admixtures, and fibres) are reviewed for their optimal use in designing and proportioning concrete mixtures. The use of concrete from design to batching, mixing, transporting, placing, consolidating, finishing, and curing is addressed.
The Cement Association of Canada (CAC) is pleased to present this Canadian and CAC member regionalized industry average environmental product declaration (EPD) for general use (GU) and portland-limestone (GUL) cements. This EPD was developed in compliance with CAN/CSA-ISO 14025 and is verified by ASTM International.
The Equivalent Pavement Design Matrix for Municipal Roadways reports provide municipal engineers and consulting engineers with the reference information they need to effectively compare the costs of concrete and asphalt pavements of equivalent design over their respective lifecycles. They present a comprehensive matrix of equivalent 25-year concrete and asphalt pavement designs for various traffic volumes, roadway classifications and subgrade strengths. They also identify the anticipated maintenance required on the pavement structures over a 50-year period and the corresponding lifecycle cost.
A recent set of case studies showcasing innovation in Alberta’s concrete sector shows the industry has a strong roster of commercially available technologies, as well a healthy pipeline of new technologies for future deployment. A number of these projects also demonstrate collaboration across industries, provinces, and countries and importantly, show progress towards achieving a more circular economy. Based on interviews with cement producers and technology vendors in the concrete sector, below, we discuss some of gaps to reaching net zero for the concrete sector, along with recommendations that emerged from these discussions.
The Cement Association of Canada, alongside the Canadian Ready-Mixed Concrete Association and our provincial partners have worked together to develop Concrete Carbon: A Guideline for Specifying Low Carbon Ready Mixed Concrete in Canada
This document provides guidance on how to specify low carbon concrete using a project concrete carbon budget approach that also supports achieving performance and constructability needs.
This project reviewed the LCCA practices in place across transportation agencies in Canada as well as in select international agencies. The guideline provides a reference guide on LCCA for alternate pavement-type bidding. The project also included the development of user-friendly EXCEL spreadsheet (based on the guideline) to aid in the analysis of life cycle costs of alternate pavement designs.
The Cement Association of Canada and Emissions Reduction Alberta have jointly prepared a summary of ten case studies of innovation and collaboration in the concrete sector supported by ERA and the TIER fund over the past ten years. Altogether, they total $70M of investment, $275M+ total project value, with over 2.2Mt CO2e direct emissions reductions by 2030 and an even greater number of enabled reductions as technologies are rolled out across the market. While this list is by no means comprehensive, these case studies are all viable decarbonization pathways across the five “C’s” being demonstrated in Alberta today. Together, show how the industry is addressing most, if not all, emissions reductions pathways and exemplify the technology leadership of Canada’s heavy industry.
This report provides an overview of the performance of PLC-based concretes compared with traditional Portland cement concretes (i.e., strength, workability, sulphate resistance, etc.), including information on its use across North America, complete with project examples.
The Cement Mill Test Report is a document that provides information about the physical and chemical properties of cement. It is produced by cement manufacturers to certify that the cement product meets the requirements of the CSA A3001 Standard. The List of Tables below identifies the CSA A3001 reference tables identifying chemical, physical and other requirements.