🌆 We are very excited to announce our investment into Cambridge Electric Cement, a University of Cambridge spinout who are decarbonising cement by recycling concrete. Concrete is the most widely used material on earth after water, and is responsible for up to 8% of global CO2 emissions. Concrete itself is made up of around 10-15% cement, water, and aggregate (sand, gravel, crushed stone). The cement and water mix to harden and bind the aggregate together. It is the production of Portland cement that is responsible for the majority of the emissions. The source of emissions are two-fold. Portland cement is made up of lime (CaO), which itself is made by heating limestone (CaCO3) to >1450°C in a limestone kiln and for every tonne of lime produced, 0.8 tonnes of CO2 are released. The high temperatures required for this calcination are provided by natural gas – which itself releases CO2 when burned. Cambridge Electric Cement’s breakthrough allows them to dramatically reduce both of the sources of emissions. Their technology - first published in Nature - exploits the high temperature of electric arc furnaces used in steel recycling to reactivate recycled cement. Using recycled cement decarbonises the calcination emissions, whilst using renewable power for the furnace decarbonises the emissions for heat. And in replacing the flux typically used in EAFs (also emissions-intensive to produce as it is usually lime) they are reducing the emissions of steel production at the same time. CEC builds upon the Innovate UK-funded £6.5m 'Cement 2 Zero' industrial demonstrator project, with a consortium including industrial partners AtkinsRéalis, Balfour Beatty plc, CELSA GROUP, Day Group Ltd, Tarmac, and the Materials Processing Institute where the technology has been proven in a 7-tonne EAF. CEC are a spin-out from the University of Cambridge, led by an exceptional founding team of Bill Yost, Poppy Brewer and academic founders Cyrille Dunant, Prof. Julian Allwood and Dr Philippa Horton. This £2.25m investment round, led by ZCC, will enable CEC to industrialise production of its sustainable cement at Celsa Steel UK’s EAF facility in Cardiff, deliver a real-world construction demonstrator, and advance offtake agreements with partners and customers. Cambridge Enterprise Ventures, Legal & General, Parkwalk Advisors, Delph25 and Almanac Ventures are also participating in the round. Following the round, ZCC's Pippa will join CEC as an Investor Director. This is our second investment in the cement space, following our investment into Biozeroc's preseed round in 2022. Biozeroc are using limestone-producing bacteria to replace cement completely. More about why we invested: https://lnkd.in/ejryghMP Press release from CEC: https://lnkd.in/ecnkHeEz Photo: BBC
Welcome to the ZCC family Cambridge Electric Cement! We're super excited.
This is exciting! Congrats to the team. Jack Vincent there’s some links to the article I was talking about the other day.
Moving forward! Congratulations Zero Carbon Capital