Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/423872
Rock Solid The concrete sector continues to pursue a strong sustainability agenda by Godfrey Budd B esides making valuable additions to the product offering, some of the key players in Canada's con- crete sector are continuing efforts to advance a sustainability agenda. New products, stringent standards, au- dits – all these are part of the mix, and many are being backed by research and benchmarked with testing programs and certification. Some of Lafarge's latest initiatives, including its recent joint development agreement with Solidia Technologies to commercialize the use of Solidia cement, appear very much in sync with this push to increase sustainability. Since the agreement was announced earlier this year, Lafarge's precast divi- sion has been moving quickly. In recent months, its manufacturing plant in Lethbridge, Alberta, has been running a series of trials as part of the process leading to commercialization. The Solidia cement concept involves the application of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the curing process and could reduce the carbon footprint of concrete by up to 70 per cent. "We will be using Solidia in hollowcore floor slabs and architectural wall panels in our Edmonton plant. It's scaled up from the Lethbridge plant and what you need in a commercial applica- tion," says Don Zakariasen, director of marketing concrete products at Lafarge North America. In anot her init iat ive, Lafarge's Edmonton-based Innovation Hub has received an Env ironment al Build- ing Evaluation ( EBD) from the Athena Sustainable Materials Institute. The two-storey building's precast sandwich panels eliminate thermal bridging and, combined with an "intelligent" build- ing management system, should have a superior thermal performance. Athena used a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach to arrive at an EBD, of which there are very few in North America. "We've done this to show lead- ership," Zakariasen says. The road to sustainability and rigor- ous standards is not without its share of bumps, however. "The Canadian Precast Prestressed Concrete Institute ( CPCI) launched its precast concrete certifica- tion program in 2007 as a response to concerns about aspects of the audits by another certification body. Some of these concerns still remain, but not with our program," says Brian Hall, manag- ing director, sustainability and business development at CPCI. The CPCI certification program outsources audits for certification to Kassian Dyck & Associates (KDA), a multi-discipline engineering consul- tancy with extensive experience audit- ing plants across the country. This ensures objectivity and adherence to rigorous standards. The firm's auditors are experienced structural and profes- sional engineers. "For the CPCI certifi- cation program, engineers in training are not permitted to audit a plant. Both owners and the precast industry benefit from a strong audit-based certifica- tion program that not only reviews the entire precast manufacturing operation of a company with a pass or fail mecha- nism, but a program that audits all of the relevant North American standards and manuals of quality control, including U.S. and Canadian standards," Hall says. Choosing the right certification is critical in the current procurement climate, especially with PPP Canada positioning itself as an enabler of P3 projects. Of ten these projects can be led by non-Canadian firms: "Our experience with P3 projects is that the CPCI-certified firms on the project will produce high-quality infrastructure products, with little to no risk, whereas the non-Canadian firms that are not CPCI certified have great difficulty, and often are not familiar with our require- ments. The last thing the public wants is low price at the expense of non-con- forming and unsafe infrastructure," explains Hall. Surrey City Hall, Surrey, B.C. Courtesy Armtec. december 2014 /23 concrete