As blogged on InterestingEngineering.com, concrete is used far and wide, across all continents, and countries. It is considered the most manufactured material in the world.

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However, how it’s currently made and used requires a high carbon footprint. With the growing awareness of reducing carbon footprints around the world, now engineers have been tasked with finding a way to create eco-friendly concrete.

A UCLA team of engineers have just been awarded a $1.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to develop 3D-printed concrete that will include carbon dioxide within its cement binder.

How is cement currently processed?

Cement, which is the part that binds concrete together, counts for eight percent of our man-made carbon footprint.

What the UCLA team will attempt to discover are different options for cement, and to incorporate carbon dioxide into the manufacturing process. The hope is that the final product will reduce the carbon footprint by 60% than the current products.

The team will be led by the principal investigator, Mathieu Bauchy, a computational materials scientist and assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering.

Keep reading this blog on InterestingEngineering.com