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This presentation will discuss how slag cement and other supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) can help reduce the carbon impact of concrete products and show attendees how to use industry wide documents and tools. Topics covered include: • Key terms and definitions commonly used when discussing the carbon impact of concrete; • How initiatives like the LEED point system, Architecture 2030, and the Carbon Leadership Forum are influencing the use of concrete materials; • How to reduce the carbon impact of concrete using SCMs like slag cement; and • How to use product specific information on slag cement including EPDs and LCA Calculator tools to show customers sustainable and durable options for concrete.

Cement is typically the largest individual contribution to the embodied global warming potential (CO2-equivalent) of a concrete mixture. The cement industry has developed roadmaps to reaching carbon neutral concrete by mid-century, both for the US and globally. This presentation will identify how cement and cementitious materials are expected to evolve in the roadmaps and discuss how effective updates to codes and standards can help to accelerate the achievement of carbon neutral concrete.

Portland cement is the most mass-produced human-made material on earth. Since the invention of Portland cement, it has become an indispensable material for building structures and social infrastructure, and it is now the cornerstone of modern society. The CO2 emitted by the cement industry is estimated to account for approximately 7% of the world's total emissions. From this background, the sector of concrete industry reacts against CO2 emissions. In this contribution, activities of government, societies, and each company in concrete sector of Japan are summarized and discuss the direction of the required research, activities, and pathway to collaboration.

The objective of this course is to introduce and explain by case studies a new document, “211.7R-15: Guide to Proportioning Concrete Mixes with Ground Limestone and Mineral Fillers”. This main objective is to propose that a blended portland limestone cement (PLC) with supplementary cementitious material (SCM) cement blend can provide an effective synergy to produce a comparable concrete to a portland cement. This course will provide studies that show different ways that PLC and SCM concretes can attain adequate compressive strength and durability to be used in many concrete applications.

Commitment to reducing the environmental impact of concrete is of great importance nowadays. In case of self-consolidating concrete (SCC), this is of critical significance given the fact that the binder content of such concrete needed to ensure the required rheological properties is normally high. The present study aims to propose an appropriate design approach for producing SCC of low carbon footprint (Eco-SCC) for building applications. The presentation elaborates the step-by-step methodology to develop the Eco-SCC including packing density approach to optimize the volumetric proportions of sand and coarse aggregate to achieve an ideal particle gradation curve. The water content is adjusted to provide the necessary minimum paste volume to obtain self-consolidating properties. The powder composition is determined according to rheological optimizations of pastes to reduce the water demand while satisfying mechanical properties and durability considerations. Such design method is found to be effective for obtaining Eco-SCC. Mixtures with total powder content ranging from 280 to 310 kg/m3 are shown to exhibit satisfactory workability characteristics and 28-day compressive strengths in the range of 25 to 30 MPa and low drying shrinkage for building applications.