Levitra Prescription
Feb 22nd, 2009 by Richard
Novacem, a spin-off from London’s Imperial College, has won the coveted Rushlight Award for its novel CO2-capturing cement process that could turn one of the world’s most CO2-intensive industries into an important CCS solution; levitra prescription.Cement production is a huge environmental problem levitra prescription, producing between six to eight percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions — and that makes the cement industry a bigger headache than aviation.
Levitra prescription: traditional Portland cement is made by heating limestone and clay in giant kilns which, according to the IEA, produces 0.83 (metric) tonnes of CO2 for every ton of cement.About half of this footprint is generated from the vast amounts of energy needed to heat the kilns (up to 1,500°C) and the other half is released by chemical reactions as the limestone decomposes.
Novacem’s cement process eschews limestone in favor of magnesium oxides; levitra prescription.Nikolaos Vlasopoulos, the company’s chief scientist, is coy about the patent-pending process, but he does say that the magnesium oxides are created from magnesium silicates; levitra prescription.The Novacem process has two main benefits; creating magnesium oxide doesn’t release CO2, and turning it into cement requires less than half the energy required to create traditional Portland cement – levitra prescription.Even better, when the cement hardens, it absorbs 1.1 metric tons of carbon dioxide, which means that the technique actually removes more than 0.7 metric tons of CO2 for every ton of cement produced. Levitra prescription: that offers enormous carbon capture and sequestration potential.
Novacem is working with Rio Tinto Minerals to source the magnesium silcates, and Vlasopoulos believe the technology could be ready for commercialization in as little as three years.The company is also working on a process that could recycle cement, so a good news story could get even better.
Levitra prescription: note: A month or so ago, I wrote about Calera, a California company is also trying to Put CO2 to Work.
