Why the world’s most efficient cement plant needs to continue to innovate

From Fast Company

The massive Ste. Geneviève complex on the banks of the Mississippi is the most efficient cement plant in the world, but can Holcim and others in the materials industry innovate fast enough to save us from climate catastrophe? This is part two of a series exploring the environmental impact of concrete.

[Source Photo: Ted Fishman]

I’m standing about 275 feet above the banks of the mighty Mississippi, watching scores of black buzzards circle and soar and swoop around me. The birds and I are all drawn to the same 4,000-acre industrial site in Bloomsdale, Missouri, one of the largest cement plants in North America and the world’s most efficient: This vast, highly engineered complex—known as the Ste. Geneviève, built by Swiss cement giant Holcim—is manned by just a few dozen people, while some smaller and less-productive plants elsewhere in the world require more than a thousand employees to run.

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