Building materials company Holcim announced that it has broken ground on its new GO4ZERO plant in Belgium, engineered to produce net zero cement, and supporting European decarbonization goals.

Planned investment in the new plant is expected to reach over €500 million, with the facility engineered to produce 2 million tons of net zero cement annually by 2029.

Building materials are a key source of global greenhouse gas emissions. Cement production, an ingredient in concrete, accounts for approximately 8% of global carbon dioxide emissions, with over 900 kg of CO2 emissions generated for every 1000 kg of material produced.

In its first phase, the new GO4ZERO project will deploy an air-oxyfuel switchable kiln with carbon purification technology at Holcim’s cement plant in Obourg, Belgium, enabling a 30% emissions intensity reduction. In a subsequent phase of the project, CO2 at the plant will be captured and purified using Cryocap technology from Air Liquide, with the captured CO2 to be sequestered under the North Sea.

The plant will source more than 95% of its energy from alternative fuels, including operating what the company said is Europe’s largest installation of floating solar panels. Additionally, more than 30% of its raw mix will come from partly decarbonized alternative raw material, predominantly waste generated by other industries.

The launch of the new project follows a series of commitments announced by Holcim last year, including a pledge to invest CHF2 billion (USD$2.2 billion) in carbon capture technologies by 2030, and to capture more than 5 million tons of CO2 per year, in addition to a target to reduce its Scope 1 emissions per ton of cementitious material by over 22% by 2030.

Miljan Gutovic, CEO Holcim Group said:

“By advancing decarbonization as a driver of profitable growth, Holcim is on course to make net-zero cement and concrete a reality at scale this decade. GO4ZERO is one of our six large-scale, European Union-supported carbon capture, utilization and storage projects. These aim to capture a total of over 5 million tons of CO₂ per annum, enabling us to offer over 8 million tons of fully decarbonized cement each year across Europe by 2030.”

Holcim’s GO4ZERO project was selected for a grant from the EU Innovation Fund last year, which will provide €230 million in support. The fund, financed by revenues from the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS), is one of the world’s largest funding programs for the demonstration of innovative low-carbon technologies.

Wopke Hoekstra, European Commissioner for Climate Action, said:

“The Innovation Fund drives the deployment of innovative, low-carbon technologies in Europe. With EUR 230 million allocated from the EU Emission Trading System for the GO4ZERO project, we look forward to seeing this example of cutting-edge partnership across the value chain to create a new ecosystem for carbon capture and storage. This is exactly in line with the European Green Deal’s objective to fully mobilize industry to achieve climate neutrality by 2050.”