When the man who invented a cement substitute that slashes the carbon footprint of concrete donates £40m towards cost of a new research facility, naturally you would expect it to be built out of said material.

Michael Uren discovered that ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBS), a waste product of steel manufacture, could be used as cement substitute in concrete. Up to 80% of the cement content can be replaced with GGBS, which makes a huge difference to the carbon footprint of the material because cement production is highly energy intensive – cement manufacture contributes about 8% of global CO₂ emissions. 

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