A report by environmental think tank Climate Analytics has concluded that claims by the cement industry - like those of iron and steel - that emissions are hard to abate are actually slowing progress.
The report, entitled Hard-to-abate: a justification for delay explores not only the latest scientific evidence on how to cut emissions but also the current state of carbon capture utilisation and storage (CCUS).
“For the cement sector, studies with more focus on high deployment of production-side measures still show that incremental changes could enable significant emission reductions at source, for example, a 55 per cent reduction in total emissions without CCUS, compared to 46 per cent in the IEA NZE scenario, by 2050.”
“CCUS poses substantial technical, economic and scalability risks. It cannot capture 100% of emissions; residual emissions are inevitable,” it adds.
According to Bill Hare, Climate Analytics CEO and co-author of the report, CCUS is effectively serving as a kind of greenwashing, based on technology that: “Doesn't work, and would not cut emissions from these sectors to zero.”
The report calls for a comprehensive approach to cement decarbonisation that moves beyond the hard-to-abate stereotype, noting that improving production efficiencies is crucial and it’s perhaps more important to examine the entire cement lifecycle. It also suggests a partial replacement of cement with alternatives such as wood and stone could alone cut emissions by 20 or 30 per cent.
“Options already exist at the protoype stage for eliminating cement’s energy-related emissions (~40% of total emissions) and more than half of overall sector emissions could be eliminated through a combination of material and energy efficiency, clinker substitution, novel cements, fuel switching, and electrification by 2050,” the report states.
A holistic (“whole-of-system”) approach to emissions control could achieve a 72 per cent reduction (compared to 2018 levels) by 2050, it concludes.
