Restricted Research - Award List, Note/Discussion Page
Fiscal Year: 2023
1514 The University of Texas at Arlington (143402)
Principal Investigator: Maria Konsta Gdoutos,maria.konsta@uta.edu,(817) 272-2704
Total Amount of Contract, Award, or Gift (Annual before 2011): $ 1,499,800
Exceeds $250,000 (Is it flagged?): Yes
Start and End Dates: 9/1/22 - 8/31/25
Restricted Research: YES
Academic Discipline: Department of Civil Engineering
Department, Center, School, or Institute: none
Title of Contract, Award, or Gift: Advancing International Partnerships in Research for Decoupling Concrete Manufacturing and Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Name of Granting or Contracting Agency/Entity:
National Science Foundation (NSF)
CFDA Link: NSF
47.041
Program Title:
Partnerships for International Research and Education (PIRE) -- Use-Inspired Research Challenges on Climate Change and Clean Energy
CFDA Linked: Engineering Grants
Note:
(SAM Category 1.1.1.) The Global Cement and Concrete Association and the White House have marked the importance for an international commitment to fully decarbonize the concrete industry and limit global warming to 1.5 oC by 2030. Two approaches that can drive to major impacts in nullifying the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in concrete industry are increasing carbon capture and sequestration through concrete’s manufacturing; and empowering low-cost energy, such as green electricity, that can be directly used in modern infrastructure to minimize the electricity consumptions from non-renewable energy sources. The vision of this project is to establish a multidisciplinary consortium between universities, research centers and corporations in the U.S. and Europe to enable cross-disciplinary scientific and use-inspired technological advancements to successfully design and develop carbon capture- and electrical energy- efficient engineered concrete targeting negative net GHG emissions in civil infrastructure worldwide. A transformative aspect of the proposed research is to significantly enhance concrete’s CO2 uptake by utilizing carbon neutral waste materials, e.g., coal ash and recycled concrete aggregates (RCAs), agriculture/forestry byproducts, e.g., biochar, and nanostructured materials, e.g., graphene, with a very high CO2 uptake potential, 14 – 30% by mass, due to their unique porous nano- and macro- structure. Designing concrete with the use of 10-30 wt% coal ash, biochar and graphene as cement replacements and RCAs has a potential net carbon removal of 110 lbs CO2 per 1000 lbs concrete. With a conservative estimate of 4.4 B tons concrete produced every year globally, our approach could translate to 482 M tons CO2 being absorbed annually, 7% higher than the annual CO2 emissions (451 M tons). The second innovative strategy is to enable a novel technology for renewable electricity and large-scale power production by generating the ability of the engineered concrete to absorb high amounts of thermal energy from solar radiation and directly convert into usable electrical energy. Inspired by the consortium’s demonstrated ability to control and tune concrete’s thermal and electrical properties at the nanoscale, this concept targets to develop a thermoelectric concrete battery technology for long-duration storage and transmission of electric power, significantly reducing the electricity consumptions from traditional energy resources and alleviating the global urban heat island.
Discussion: No discussion notes