The city of Magna, Utah, was once the home of a major coal-fired power plant that provided electricity for Rio Tinto’s enormous copper mine next door. But in 2019, the company shuttered the last of the four coal units, opting instead to power its mining operations with wind and solar energy.
Now plans are underway to open a different kind of industrial facility in the former coal community, one that will use waste rocks from the Kennecott copper mine to help make low-carbon concrete.
On Tuesday, Terra CO2 Technology was picked to receive a $52.6 million federal grant to build a new manufacturing plant just west of Salt Lake City. The company has devised a method that turns common minerals into additives that can help replace Portland cement — a key component in concrete, and one of the most carbon-intensive materials in the world.
“Most of what we’re focused on is reducing the carbon footprint of cement and concrete,” Bill Yearsley, CEO&nb... Read more
