For the past twenty years, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has hosted the Entrepreneurship Competition for new companies founded by MIT graduates in six key areas: products and services, web and IT, energy, development, mobile, and life sciences. The winner of each category competes for the overall grand prize of one-hundred thousand dollars. This year’s energy and overall winner, out of some two-hundred teams, was a cement-alternative developer called C-Crete Technologies.
C-Crete’s play in this space is a special type of nano-engineered, carbon negative cement that has improved strength over traditional cement. C-Crete’s co-founder Natanel Barookhian said, “For many years, the world has been looking for simple, scalable solutions to reduce the global carbon footprint and limit its impact on the environment. We at C-Crete Technologies have developed a method for tackling this issue by targeting the production of cement, one of the most widely used materials on earth, while improving all of its core properties. We believe our technology will make a significant impact on the world.’’
C-Crete is one of the growing number of start-up companies (Calera, C-Fix, CeramiCrete, etc) who are focused on replacements, alternatives, or supplements for traditional cement. This niche is beginning to attract a fair amount of attention from venture capitalists. Also, after ignoring the possibility that the cement manufacturing process might be fundamentally changed in no less significant a way than refrigeration changed the ice harvesting business, the traditional producers and industry insiders are now taking notice. While fly ash and similar materials have long been recognized and utilized, research into “manufactured” supplemental cementitious materials is now being directly funded by cement producers. These materials may never entirely replace cement, unquestionably one of the most cost effective and flexible building materials available, but environmental challenges make research expenditures a wise investment in the future.
Congratulations to C-Crete on this important recognition. As the issue of CO2 emissions related to the manufacture of cement attracts more money and institutional research interest, the cement industry is certain to change. Those who recognize this inevitibility and invest in developing a vision of the future stand to gain much. Those who ignore the signs may go the way of the icebox.