Taken individually, coal ash and excess carbon dioxide are harmful pollutants. Combined in just the right way, they form a durable, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly building material.
University of Wisconsin–Madison spinoff Alithic is leveraging this unique formula to turn waste streams from liabilities into profits, producing a key ingredient of concrete, the most abundant manufactured product in the world.
Based on a discovery by engineering professor Bu Wang, Alithic uses chemical reactions to pull carbon dioxide from the air and mix it with industrial wastes like coal ash, generating a mineral product — known as supplementary cementitious material, or SCM — that can be substituted for traditional Portland cement, one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions.
Read the full story here: https://www.wisconsin.edu/all-in-wisconsin/story/this-uw-madison-spinoff-is-making-environmentally-friendly-cement-the-secret-ingredient-is-pollution/