MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub

MIT

  • The April 22nd Resilience Executive Roundtable@MIT brought together leaders across construction, insurance, fire safety, and other industries to discuss the need for stronger construction to protect homes, lives, and communities from intensifying natural hazards.

    The MIT CSHub has created a summary report which provides an overview of the roundtable, barriers and opportunities for achieving more resilient construction, as well as action items and next steps.

    Click here to read the summary report.

    Thank you to our steering committee: the National Association of State Fire Marshals, National Ready Mixed Concrete Association, U.S. Resiliency Council, MIT Humanitarian Supply Chain Lab, National Institute of Building Sciences, American Cement Association, Build With Strength, Smart Home America, Building Resilience Coalition, Concrete Advancement Foundation, and MIT Center for Real Estate.

  • Our research brief led by alumna Dr. Ipek Bensu Manav examines the emissions impact of materials choices and repairs in hazard-prone areas. The Florida case study demonstrates that durable, hazard-resilient materials may contribute to lower life cycle emissions despite higher upfront emissions, thanks to savings in the repair and replacement stages.

    Click here to read the brief.

  • This research brief led by Dr. Haoran Li evaluates the potential benefits and costs of increasing ready mixed concrete (RMC) truck gross vehicle weight limits beyond current federal thresholds, while remaining within the trucks’ capacity. In many cases, current weight limits prevent trucks from operating at capacity. In a modeled case study of a Pennsylvania interstate, the team found that allowing heavier gross loads reduces the number of RMC trucks needed to deliver the same volume of concrete, lowering costs, GHG emissions, and fuel use without affecting pavement deterioration or the fuel use or performance of other vehicles.

    Click here to read the brief.

  • AI is reshaping the future of concrete. In MIT News, a CSHub and Olivetti Group team explains how they’re using chatbots and machine learning to find new materials that can replace a portion of cement in concrete. As industry looks to reduce costs and emissions, demand for traditional cement supplements is outstripping supply. The MIT team’s method scans through hundreds of thousands of pages of scientific literature and over a million rock samples to find alternative, globally available candidates from demolished construction materials to biomass.

    Click here to read the story in MIT News.

  • To secure a more sustainable future, we must take a careful look at the long-term performance and environmental impacts of our pavements. Haoran Li, a postdoc at the MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub and the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, is deeply invested in studying how to give stakeholders the information and tools they need to make informed pavement decisions with the future in mind. Here, he discusses life-cycle assessments for pavements as well as research from MIT in addressing pavement sustainability.

    Click here to read the story.

  • Congratulations to Dr. Hessam AzariJafari for earning the American Concrete Institute’s Young Member Award for Professional Achievement. He is recognized “for contributions to the advancement of life cycle assessment in the study of the sustainability of concrete, its implementation in measuring the environmental impacts of construction materials, and its use in carbon emissions policy to achieve carbon neutrality.” He has chaired the ACI Eco Concrete Competition since 2017, chairs ACI 130-G (Education), and serves as secretary of ACI 130 (Sustainability of Concrete) among other involvement across the Institute.

    Click to read the announcement.

  • A CSHub team led by Dr. Soroush Mahjoubi has published two briefs on concrete overdesign and strength testing variability. The team finds that optimizing concrete overdesign—the intentional and required process of designing concrete to meet a higher strength than specified—can lead to savings of 80kg CO2e/m3, a 25% reduction in the GHG emissions of concrete mixtures. They further reveal that concrete strength testing variability causes producers to design higher-strength concrete than necessary. Reducing testing variability results in a 40kg CO2e/m3 reduction in the operational emissions of concrete mixtures.

    Read the first brief on overdesign.

    Read the second brief on testing.

  • Natural disasters are projected to cost the U.S. nearly $40 billion annually by 2075, highlighting the escalating financial burden of climate-driven disasters. The mounting devastation caused by these extreme events underscores a sobering reality: inaction on current and future construction will only deepen the economic and human toll.

    The Trump administration and the new Congress must act decisively to protect the economy’s stability and our communities’ safety. At the MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub, we advance research and develop tools that empower stakeholders—policymakers, insurance companies, code officials, and developers—to enhance building strength and durability by integrating materials science, structural engineering, and economic modeling. We propose enforcing updated building and infrastructure codes, prioritizing the use of stronger materials, and instituting tax incentives to encourage stronger construction.

    Read more in Real Clear Energy.

  • By mid-century, two out of every three persons on the planet will be living in urban areas. These growing urban populations face two simultaneous climate challenges; extreme heat events attributed to Urban Heat Island (UHI) effects, and Global Climate Change (GCC).”

    These projections come from a 2021 study co-authored by MIT researchers Hessam AzariJafari, Randolph Kirchain, Xin Xu and Jeremy Gregory evaluating the impact of cool pavement on urban centres.

    Several measures are being undertaken to address UHI mitigation around the world. These include increased urban vegetation and the installation of “cool roofs.” However, not all these strategies are within the control of municipal decision-makers, making it difficult for cities to implement effective solutions.

    Yet, pavement material change is one strategy over which cities have a strong influence, if not total control, the researchers write, and it could make a significant difference.

    Read the article.

  • “Roman concrete to me is fascinating: It’s still standing after all this time and constantly repairing,” said Prof. Admir Masic in his MIT News feature. Read the article.