Lafarge signed with US start-up Solidia Technologies® to industrialize innovative technology that could reduce the environmental footprint of pre-cast concrete

Paris, France, 17-10-2013 — /EuropaWire/ — Lafarge has signed a partnership agreement with the US start-up Solidia Technologies® to industrialize an innovative technology that could reduce the environmental footprint of pre-cast concrete. The technology allows lower CO2 emissions in the cement production process, and involves the capture of CO2 in precast concrete manufacturing. Overall, CO2 emissions could be reduced by up to 70%.

As part of the agreement, Lafarge will work with Solidia to demonstrate feasibility of commercial-scale production in the first half of 2014. The two companies will collaborate to market this technology as a new solution for the pre-cast sector.

This partnership illustrates Lafarge’s commitment to bring to the market innovative solutions contributing to building better cities. Lafarge Research Center, the world’s leading research facility in building materials, holds a portfolio of more than 1,000 patents which has tripled since 2005. Lafarge has been working for over 20 years to reduce its environmental footprint and in particular, its CO2 emissions. These have been reduced by nearly 25% per ton of cement since 1990.

NOTES TO EDITORS

Solidia Technologies® is a cement and concrete technology company with patented processes that make it easy and profitable to use CO2 to create superior and sustainable building, construction and industrial products. A winner of the 2013 R&D Top 100 Award, Solidia’s processes cure concrete with CO2 instead of water and use a sustainable cement as binder, reducing the carbon footprint of concrete products up to 70 percent, lowering production costs, and enhancing performance. Solidia Concrete™ offers broader application choices in durability, strength, material reduction, and casting-using the same raw materials and equipment but less water, energy and time. Based in Piscataway, New Jersey (USA), Solidia’s investors include Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Bright Capital, BASF, and BP. Follow Solidia Technologies at www.solidiatech.com, on LinkedIn and Twitter: @SolidiaCO2.

A world leader in building materials, Lafarge employs 65,000 people in 64 countries, and posted sales of €15.8 billion in 2012. As a top-ranking player in its Cement, Aggregates and Concrete businesses, it contributes to the construction of cities around the world, through its innovative solutions providing them with more housing and making them more compact, more durable, more beautiful, and better connected. With the world’s leading building materials research facility, Lafarge places innovation at the heart of its priorities in order to contribute to more sustainable construction and to better serve architectural creativity. Since 2010, the Lafarge Group has been part of the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index, the first global sustainability benchmark in recognition of its sustainable development actions.

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