By some measurements, cement production alone is responsible for about 8% of human-caused carbon dioxide emissions every year. And so there is an imperative to find suitable low-carbon alternatives. Here is what is currently happening in the US (via Grist):
On Tuesday, Terra CO2 Technology was picked to receive a $52.6 million federal grant to build a new manufacturing plant just west of Salt Lake City. The company has devised a method that turns common minerals into additives that can help replace Portland cement — a key component in concrete, and one of the most carbon-intensive materials in the world.
In addition to this new facility, the company is set to start construction on its first plant in the Dallas-Fort Worth area:
By some measurements, cement production alone is responsible for about 8% of human-caused carbon dioxide emissions every year. And so there is an imperative to find suitable low-carbon alternatives. Here is what is currently happening in the US (via Grist):
On Tuesday, Terra CO2 Technology was picked to receive a $52.6 million federal grant to build a new manufacturing plant just west of Salt Lake City. The company has devised a method that turns common minerals into additives that can help replace Portland cement — a key component in concrete, and one of the most carbon-intensive materials in the world.
In addition to this new facility, the company is set to start construction on its first plant in the Dallas-Fort Worth area:
The project is expected to break ground in January 2025 and begin shipping out materials by late summer 2026, Yearsley said. The facility will be capable of producing up to 240,000 metric tons of SCM [supplementary cementitious materials] per year when completed, or enough to serve roughly half of the local metropolitan market.
And all of this is part of a broader initiative by the US Department of Energy:
The Utah facility is one of 14 projects provisionally selected this week to receive $428 million in total awards from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains. The initiative, which is funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, aims to accelerate clean energy manufacturing in U.S. communities with decommissioned coal facilities. Officials said the projects are expected to create over 1,900 high-quality jobs across a dozen states.
We have spoken before about the importance of speed and rapid decision making in real estate development. But in practice, it's obviously a little more complicated than just being good at making quick and high-quality decisions. And that's because building a building is complicated and it requires teams of people, all working toward the same goal. Some of these people will be internal to your organization, but many will be external, which is a feature that further complicates matters. Because it means that, to varying degrees, there are critical path items -- items that control your overall project schedule -- that are not fully in your immediate control. This is one of the things makes development and construction so challenging.
Now, ordinarily, when a team is being assembled people will talk about their project experience, their systems and fancy tech, and perhaps some of the awards they've won because of their extreme talent. But what doesn't often get talked about is the simplest and most basic of things: You want people who will do what they said they would do, when they said they would do it. In other words, you want responsive and reliable people. This sounds pretty banal, which is maybe why it so often goes unspoken, but it's fundamental to the success of a project. The other nuance to this is that, most of the time, it's less about the company itself and more about the individual human who will be working on the project. Is that person good?
Just being responsive, reliable, and on top of things goes a long way. These are the kinds of people you want on your team and it's how you move fast.
It's in Google My Maps and what he has done is pin every project according to status: under construction, under renovation, approved, proposed, and recently delivered. For each pin, you'll also find information like the expected completion date, the use(s), the area, the architect(s), and photos. It is unbelievably detailed and, according to Google, it was last updated 8 hours ago.
Here's the full map with all statuses shown:
The project is expected to break ground in January 2025 and begin shipping out materials by late summer 2026, Yearsley said. The facility will be capable of producing up to 240,000 metric tons of SCM [supplementary cementitious materials] per year when completed, or enough to serve roughly half of the local metropolitan market.
And all of this is part of a broader initiative by the US Department of Energy:
The Utah facility is one of 14 projects provisionally selected this week to receive $428 million in total awards from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains. The initiative, which is funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, aims to accelerate clean energy manufacturing in U.S. communities with decommissioned coal facilities. Officials said the projects are expected to create over 1,900 high-quality jobs across a dozen states.
We have spoken before about the importance of speed and rapid decision making in real estate development. But in practice, it's obviously a little more complicated than just being good at making quick and high-quality decisions. And that's because building a building is complicated and it requires teams of people, all working toward the same goal. Some of these people will be internal to your organization, but many will be external, which is a feature that further complicates matters. Because it means that, to varying degrees, there are critical path items -- items that control your overall project schedule -- that are not fully in your immediate control. This is one of the things makes development and construction so challenging.
Now, ordinarily, when a team is being assembled people will talk about their project experience, their systems and fancy tech, and perhaps some of the awards they've won because of their extreme talent. But what doesn't often get talked about is the simplest and most basic of things: You want people who will do what they said they would do, when they said they would do it. In other words, you want responsive and reliable people. This sounds pretty banal, which is maybe why it so often goes unspoken, but it's fundamental to the success of a project. The other nuance to this is that, most of the time, it's less about the company itself and more about the individual human who will be working on the project. Is that person good?
Just being responsive, reliable, and on top of things goes a long way. These are the kinds of people you want on your team and it's how you move fast.
It's in Google My Maps and what he has done is pin every project according to status: under construction, under renovation, approved, proposed, and recently delivered. For each pin, you'll also find information like the expected completion date, the use(s), the area, the architect(s), and photos. It is unbelievably detailed and, according to Google, it was last updated 8 hours ago.
Here's the full map with all statuses shown:
And here's what it looks like if you filter by only projects under construction:
It's interesting, but not surprising, to note that the majority of construction projects seem to be taking place outside the boundaries of Paris proper. However, if you alternate to projects under renovation, it more or less flips, with most of the projects being within Paris:
This tells you something about the city.
Sometimes when I'm looking at or for information like this, I think to myself that I must be in the minority of people who are interested in tracking development projects with this level of detail. So I find it interesting that this map has been viewed nearly 300,000 times. Clearly, I'm not actually alone.
And here's what it looks like if you filter by only projects under construction:
It's interesting, but not surprising, to note that the majority of construction projects seem to be taking place outside the boundaries of Paris proper. However, if you alternate to projects under renovation, it more or less flips, with most of the projects being within Paris:
This tells you something about the city.
Sometimes when I'm looking at or for information like this, I think to myself that I must be in the minority of people who are interested in tracking development projects with this level of detail. So I find it interesting that this map has been viewed nearly 300,000 times. Clearly, I'm not actually alone.
