Southwest Ohio Group Learns about Sustainable Concrete

Print this Article | Send to Colleague

Sustainability was recently on the minds of the Greater Miami Valley Chapter of the American Concrete Institute when NRMCA Senior National Resource Director Doug O’Neill was asked to speak. A group of about 45 industry professionals listened to O'Neill discuss the sustainable aspects of concrete; they were in attendance thanks to the efforts of John Davidson of the Ohio Ready Mixed Concrete Association, who was instrumental in setting up the meeting.

The message was clear: Concrete is one of the oldest, most versatile and environmentally-friendly building materials on the planet. "It’s our ability as an industry to communicate our sustainability message to the marketplace that seems to be holding us back," O’Neill said. He termed "the Big Six" sustainable attributes as:
• Locally Produced
• Light Color
• Energy and Fuel Efficient Buildings and Pavements
• A Solution to Stormwater Management Issues
• Use of SCM’s
• Durability

"If every ready mixed concrete and cement field representative could commit these six basic environmentally-beneficial advantages to memory and learn how to best communicate them to the folks that specify and use our product every day, our industry would be in a tremendous position to capitalize on what we already know, that concrete construction makes sense when building GREEN," O'Neill said. "Build it right the first time and have future generation’s needs already met."

For more information or to learn about the upcoming Webinar schedule for "Effectively Communicating Sustainability" hosted by O’Neill, e-mail him at doneill@nrmca.org.