Public Funding for Cloud Cycle LTD.

As the world's most used man-made material and single-largest industrial-source of CO2, concrete decarbonisation represents a critical component of sustainable construction and the cornerstone of a a global net-zero economy. Almost 90% of concrete greenhouse-gas emissions are due to the process of producing portland cement clinker. Mix design optimisation through the use of alternative binders or reduced use of cement are therefore the most widely endorsed decarbonisation strategies. However, technical uncertainties in the mechanical performance, batch consistency and durability of low/alternate binder concrete mixes currently represent critical bottlenecks in the adoption of Low Carbon Concrete, with few mix designers willing to adopt alternate mixes as a result. Concrete digitization (digital tools for improving mix design, traceability and quality control) have the potential to provide the required assurance on the performance of Low-Carbon-Concrete, the requisite technology to do this accurately and at scale has however to date been largely unavailable With Innovate UK support and combining innovations in sensor technology, machine learning and predictive data analytics, Cloud Cycle will seek to address this global industrial challenge with a real-time-monitoring system that will provide the required confidence to support mix design optimisation and introduce greater transparency in concrete production and in doing so addressing the primary challenges associated with the adoption of low carbon concrete. The project will deliver a prototype of the solution with a trial in an operational environment, project outputs to be exploited in a global market for low carbon concrete forecast to reach USD4.3Bn by 2032\.

Cloud Cycle Ltd, led by Dr Emeso Ojo (project lead), Dr Mohamed Ismail (technical lead), Geraldine Hodges (commercial lead) and Dr Ed Waugh (engineering lead), is a UK concrete technology SME developing a cost-effective sensor monitoring system for the fresh concrete industry. In ready-mixed concrete production, over-ordering by customers or ineffective quality control measures result in the return of unused fresh concrete to the batch plant. From a global perspective, it is estimated that around 1-13% of waste concrete is generated during construction, amounting to approximately £40 billion annually. Given the high CO2 emissions associated with concrete production (corresponding to about 7% of global emissions), concrete producers are constantly faced with the challenge to satisfy targets for waste minimization and resource efficiency. Responding to this challenge, Cloud Cycle proposes developing a cost-effective monitoring system capable of measuring water-cement ratio, yield stress and plastic viscosity of fresh concrete. Material properties which are instrumental in the constructability (pour, compaction, finishing) and performance of concrete.

The UK cement industry is facing increasing pressure to reduce its emissions profile in line with government targets (net zero 2050) and end-users that a looking for 'low-carbon' concrete solutions. Furthermore, there is a shortage of supply versus demand for cement throughout the UK, whereby 5% of concrete goes to waste on construction projects and Covid19 has exacerbated supply constraints. Cloud Cycle's innovation looks to address these issues through redistributing surplus concrete onsite, linking into BIM to allow for improved design, procurement and quality control. This project will also allow for the integration of LCA/emissions reporting functionality, improving oversight of full supply-chain emissions from cement production to end-use. Access to this data and capabilities will make the UK cement industry more sustainable and competitive in the face of extreme production challenges caused by Covid19\.

Waste concrete has become a global construction problem, with over 500M tonnes of surplus concrete being sent to landfill every year. The CO2 produced for the manufacture of structural concrete (using ~14% cement) is estimated at 176 kg/tonne (This is Concrete, 2017), meaning that 88M tonnes of CO2 is unnecessarily released into the atmosphere every year. To bring the concrete sector in line with the Paris Agreement, its annual emissions will need to fall by at least 16% by 2030 (Energy Technology Perspectives, 2017). There is therefore a strong need to find valorisation in surplus concrete by creating a circular economy for concrete, in turn reducing the carbon footprint of this industry. In response, Cloud Cycle has developed an innovative solution that combines digital sensor technology in concrete trucks with intelligent analytics to calculate the volume, temperature, location & time remaining before the concrete load sets. Cloud Cycle's online platform enables concrete companies to manage wet concrete loads more efficiently, reducing waste and connecting surplus concrete with buyers, directly reducing surplus concrete from going to landfill, therefore reducing the carbon footprint of concrete production. The focus areas of the project will be research development into the temperature of the in-transit concrete and its relation to time taken to set and distance it can travel before it sets, combined with data analytics and software/hardware integration for trial implementation in order to verify system performance and testing/validation of the business model. Cloud Cycle will partner with Concrete Mixology in this project to help develop and prove the efficacy of the technology and business model.

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