First closing of Novacem’s Green Cement Bond
Novacem, the carbon negative cement company, today announced the first closing of its Green Cement Bond, together with the participation of Lafarge as the first subscriber.
The Novacem Green Cement Bond is an innovative commercial and financial approach for engagement with major cement manufacturers to accelerate the development and commercialisation of Novacem’s negative carbon cement. The Bond is for a nominal UK£1m (through a combination of Non Refundable Engineering fees and Convertible Loan Notes). It is expected that subscribers to the Bond will also participate in the Series A Funding round currently being planned by Novacem.
Novacem’s carbon negative cement is based on magnesium oxide and offers the cement industry a scalable alternative to current carbon intensive production. No carbon emissions are released from the magnesium silicate raw material used, and overall more CO2 is absorbed than emitted during production. Novacem features on MIT Technology Review’s list of the world’s ten most important emerging technologies for 2010.
Novacem will employ the proceeds from both the Bond and the Series A Funding to accelerate its development programme to construct and operate a Semi Commercial Novacem Plant (up to 25,000tpa) to be co-located with an existing cement plant. Bond subscribers will work with Novacem in the development of the Plant and share valuable experience in the production of Novacem’s carbon negative cement. They will also have early access to Plant output for testing, development, certification, pilot projects and early sales. Additionally, they will have the opportunity to build and operate the first Commercial Volume Novacem Plants under license from Novacem. Thereafter, Novacem expects to roll out other Commercial Volume Novacem Plants to the subscribers as well as to other cement companies and qualified parties.
Stuart Evans, Chairman of Novacem, commented “We have always known that we would need to work closely with the cement industry to urgently tackle, together, the very serious carbon emissions problems that the industry faces. We couldn’t have hoped for a better first cement industry partner than Lafarge.”
Published under Cement News
