US Start-Up Says It can Completely Decarbonize Cement Industry

today's built environments are at least partially made of concrete, making it the second most used material on Earth after water. But making concrete emits almost as much carbon dioxide as a car because its main ingredient, cement, is made from limestone. Limestone naturally contains about 50% carbon dioxide by weight.

Brimstone Energy, a California-based startup, is one of the companies working to reduce carbon emissions from cement production.

Brimstone uses calcium silicate rock, which is more abundant than limestone, and uses a patented technology to strip the calcium. Unlike limestone, however, silicate rock contains no carbon dioxide, so there are no such emissions from the production process. Last July, the company received certification that its product is essentially the same as cement. "People already know how to use it to build, so construction won't be delayed and there won't be safety issues,"

said Brimstone co-founder and CEO Cody Finke.

The company is still in the early stages and is building a pilot plant, but Fink said it would be cheaper to produce cement once it is scaled up.

"Ultimately, our plan and goal is to develop a reliable and low-cost process to produce cement on a large scale.". As a result, our process will eventually replace 100% of the world's cement production facilities due to lower costs, resulting in a fully decarbonized system, "Fink said.". The goal of

changing the way cement is made is particularly attractive to investors.

"There are about 3,000 cement plants on the planet today that will eventually start to replace the old process with this new process, which actually represents trillions of dollars of fixed asset investment potential, all of which is driven by profit incentives." Said Cooper Rinzler of the Breakthrough Energy Ventures, one of Brimstone's supporters.

In addition to Breakthrough, Brimstone's investors also include Climate Pledge Fund from DCVC, the Collaborative Fund, Fifth Wall, S2G Ventures and Amazon. The company has raised $60 million to date.