Conor Hayes, the new Head of Sustainability at the Irish Concrete Federation, chats about empowering the concrete sector to address sustainability in a meaningful way

What does your new role entail?
The Irish Concrete Federation is the national representative organisation for the Irish aggregates and concrete products industry, representing 74 members and associate members operating at approximately 300 locations throughout the country. The membership is made up of both publicly listed and family-owned businesses. Our members are responsible for the manufacture and supply of the key building materials used in the construction of Ireland’s built environment. The majority of our members manufacture aggregates (crushed rock, sand and gravel), ready mixed concrete and precast concrete products for supply to the Irish construction industry. In addition, some members manufacture agricultural lime which is used by farmers to improve soil fertility.

As Head of Sustainability for the Irish Concrete Federation, the brief for the role is to promote and embed sustainability into our members’ activities, processes and procedures. Amongst other activities this includes facilitating and promoting research and innovation, providing technical support and training for members in areas such as carbon reduction, biodiversity, recycling, waste reduction, resource conservation, circularity and collaborating with Government and construction industry stakeholders as we all navigate towards a more sustainable built environment.

 

Is the perception that concrete is bad for the environment changing?
There is a growing understanding that the sustainability challenges we face involve addressing every aspect of the built environment and must be considered by all those involved in procuring, designing and executing our built environment – including but not limited to those designing and supplying concrete. Concrete is a fantastically useful material; strong, durable, versatile, locally produced with excellent thermal mass, acoustic and fire performance properties. There’s a reason it is the most used human-made material on earth! Our society needs concrete as part of our net-zero transition. Lots of concrete will be required to facilitate our net-zero ambitions; public transport tunnels, wind turbine bases, electrification works and so on in addition to that required to provide housing, schools and hospitals. Concrete will be required for climate mitigation.

Concrete is not particularly carbon intensive relative to other construction materials, but its scale of use means that there is inevitably a focus on the associated environmental impact.

What are some of the advancements being made in the industry around sustainable concrete?
Firstly, it is worth noting that significant advancements have been made already. Since I first entered the workforce as a structural engineer in the late 2000s, the carbon intensity of a typical m3 of structural concrete in Ireland has reduced by approximately 20-30% due to the switch to CEM II cement, the use of alternative fuels in cement production and the adoption of cement replacements such as GGBS. This needs to and will continue as the cement industry invests in thermal efficiency, decarbonisation of its fuel sources and reduction of cement-to-clinker ratio and as concrete designers optimise for material efficiency and reduced cement contents. The latter will likely include increased use of prestress/post-tensioning and the adoption of more efficient structural forms helped by the ever-increasing adoption of digital design and fabrication techniques. Furthermore, in the next couple of years, we can expect to see alternative lower-carbon binders and additions becoming available in the marketplace.

Concrete suppliers are addressing other parts of their potential impact; decarbonising transport emissions, electrifying plant operations, installing PV, rewilding land, recycling water within their operations and facilitating biodiversity on their sites. Improved circularity will benefit all aspects of sustainability. The durability of concrete facilitates the future adaption and reuse of existing concrete assets.

Precast concrete suppliers in particular will be in a position to utilise material passporting to facilitate design for deconstruction and reuse. In addition, the industry is embracing the recent EPA Article 28 National Criteria for recycled aggregates and hopes to work with the EPA to extend the range of allowable uses.

Sequestration of carbon – whether in the form of recarbonation of concrete or explicit carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) – will also contribute to the solution over a longer term. Recarbonation already occurs and is increasingly being recognised in carbon accounting. Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) involves trapping carbon dioxide from an industrial source or from the air and storing it securely.

Carbon Capture, Utilisation or Storage (CCUS) includes the opportunity to make use of the captured carbon. For example, technologies are available, including in Ireland, which involve impregnating fresh concrete with carbon dioxide and both storing that carbon dioxide permanently and accelerating early strength gain so that cement contents can be reduced. Implementing CCUS on a broad scale will require Government support, both to create a coherent legislative and policy framework and to support the construction of necessary national transport and storage infrastructure. This is recognised in Ireland’s latest Climate Action Plan (2024). These are exciting times in the sector.

What steps is the Society taking to promote concrete’s sustainable credentials?
The intent is simply to engage honestly and proactively with all stakeholders. One of our key aims for the Federation and members is to ‘embrace the numbers’. By making measurement of sustainability impacts a normal part of the process, we can focus our efforts on reducing externalities, optimise mixes and element designs for sustainability and show the merits of concrete as opposed to other construction materials or systems. This will include some of the other benefits – local employment, biodiversity, local supply of raw materials – that are not always recognised in the public discussion.

We are keen that all products and construction materials are assessed under consistent, accurate standards. We aim to close the loop between procurers/designers and the concrete industry, ensuring that lessons learned and opportunities developed by our members are shared with the industry at large and that the concrete industry supports those attempting to build more sustainable and more circular projects.

Ultimately, we have the same aim for the sector as the rest of society – production of a sustainable, economic, high-performance construction product.

What are your ambitions in your new role?
Over my career in the industry as a structural engineer, multi-disciplinary engineering project manager, sustainability consultant and with global roles in Arup in terms of structural engineering sustainability and embodied carbon, I consistently gave the advice to others that they should engage with the supply chain. From a selfish, personal perspective, the role at the Irish Concrete Federation has given me a gilt-edged opportunity to take my own advice, to really get to understand the biggest supply chain in our industry and to work hand-in-hand with them on one of the most important challenges of our time. Ambitions-wise, I hope to help empower the aggregate and concrete sector to address sustainability in a proactive and meaningful way and help create a regenerative concrete industry and to collaborate with Government and construction industry partners to facilitate this.

Images courtesy of Jack Hobhouse

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Michael McDonnell Managing Editor of Irish Construction Industry Magazine & Plan Magazine

Email: michael@irishconstruction.com      WWW.MCDMEDIA.IE