Suggested Citation:
Olsson, Josefine A. and Sabbie Miller (2025)

Brief: Mitigating CO2 Emissions from California’s Concrete Infrastructure

In this project, researchers from the University of California, Davis reviewed key, rapidly implementable strategies to mitigate emissions from cement and concrete used in state funded infrastructure projects. The research included performing a series of analyses to determine emissions reduction pathways throughout the cement life cycle, highlighting the potential to reduce emissions by designing new infrastructure for increased material efficiency. This policy brief summarizes the findings from that research and provides policy implications.

This policy brief is drawn from “Near-term pathways for decarbonizing global concrete production” by Josefine Olsson and Sabbie Miller of the University of California Davis in collaboration with Mark Alexander of the University of Cape Town. This paper can be found at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-40302-0. Aspects tied to end-of-life concrete handling were informed by “Parameters Driving Concrete Carbonation at its End-of-Life for Direct Air Capture in Transportation Projects,” a report from the National Center for Sustainable Transportation, authored by Kelli Knight and Sabbie Miller of the University of California, Davis. The full report can be found on the NCST website at https://ncst.ucdavis.edu/project/utilizing-concrete-its-end-life-direct-air-capture.