US-based Biomason claims to be the only company in the world that uses microorganisms to grow sustainable, structural biocement in ambient temperatures without emitting CO2. What’s more, the material is completely salvageable, recyclable and reusable.
“We are on a direct flight to revolutionise the cement industry,” said Ginger Krieg Dosier, the company’s president, CEO and co-founder. “Rather than incrementally improving the traditional methods of cement production that contribute to climate change today, we are curing the root disease – not treating the symptoms.”
Biomason produces precast bricks, called Biolith, using a mixture of 85% recycled granite and 15% bacteria. This is filled into a mould and fed with a nutrient solution. Five days later the solid bricks are removed and ready to use. This method mimics nature’s use of carbon as a building block, creating cement in a biological, circular system, rather than relying on the climate-intensive Portland cement (OPC) production process, which releases CO2 as a by-product.
Concrete, in which cement is the key ingredient, is the second-most consumed material in the world after water. OPC production accounts for more than 8% of global carbon emissions.
Biolith is said to exceed the physical properties of standard building materials for compressive strength, absorption, freeze-thaw, adhesion and dimensional tolerance, while offering the lowest carbon footprint on the market. It is suitable for exterior and interior, vertical and horizontal use in commercial, institutional and residential building projects, and to make paving. The product has been used in various projects in the US and Europe.
Biomason also engineers other products in collaboration with the US Department of Defense. These include Engineered Living Marine Cement (ELMc) which contains self-sustaining, natural marine microorganisms that source the nutrients they require from seawater.
Dr Blake Bextine, Biological Technologies Office programme manager at the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, said: “Such engineered living materials would also have the ability to respond to their environment in designed ways, self-repairing in response to physical or other stresses, or detecting the presence of specific stimuli such as hazardous compounds.”
Potential applications for ELMc include supportive marine infrastructure, breakwater assemblies and near-shore sediment stabilisation.
Another military solution is Medusa, an agile, soil stabilisation application that enables safe take-off and landing of helicopters in areas where there isn’t a specific landing surface.
There are other institutions researching similar technologies, but they are not in production yet. The University of Colorado at Boulder’s Living Materials Laboratory is investigating a cement-free, living, recyclable building material using cyanobacteria – green microorganisms similar to algae – that use CO2 and sunlight to grow, and help trap carbon.
Researchers at TU Delft in The Netherlands are looking at how the self-healing capacity of concrete structures can be improved by using calcite-precipitating bacteria.
The Hub for Biotechnology in the Built Environment is a research project bringing together bio-scientists from Northumbria University and architects, designers and engineers from Newcastle University to develop biotechnologies that would help create buildings that are responsive to their environment. The research focuses on producing living engineered materials that would metabolise their waste.
And NASA is exploring technologies that could grow structures out of fungi on the Moon and Mars, and perhaps lead to more sustainable ways of living on Earth.
Get to grips with the future factory at Advanced Manufacturing (18-22 July), part of the Engineering Futures webinar series. Register for FREE today.
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