Building a green Europe

The European cement industry was one of the first sectors to present a 2050 Carbon Neutrality Roadmap following the publication of the Green Deal by the European Commission in December 2019. CEMBUREAU’s initial carbon neutrality roadmap – published almost exactly four years ago – set out the decarbonisation levers across the five stages of the cement and concrete value chain (clinker – cement – concrete – construction – carbonation).

CEMBUREAU’s carbon neutrality roadmap was as much a statement of ambition – being clear that it is possible to reach carbon neutrality, even in a hard-to-abate sectors like cement – as a call for policies to support this ambition. It also demonstrated to policymakers that the cement sector is ready to engage seriously on its decarbonisation pathways.

Four years on, the association decided to take stock of where the industry is at, to revise its level of ambition, and publish its Net Zero Roadmap update.

In addition to assessing the progress made since the publication of the initial roadmap, it wanted to come up with a 2040 objective for the decarbonisation of the sector (the EU itself is currently discussing its own 2040 targets) and get ready for the new political cycle following the June European election.

Scaling up climate ambitions

Looking at CEMBUREAU’s updated roadmap, it is clear that a lot can happen in four years. And the association’s message is equally clear: in light of ongoing decarbonisation projects, the industry can scale up its net-zero ambitions. Yet, a robust policy framework is an indispensable condition to meet these.

As evidenced in the roadmap, the pipeline of decarbonisation investments in the cement sector is indeed strong, and has allowed the scaling up of ambition as follows:

• By 2030: CO₂ emissions reduction of 37% (previous roadmap: 30%) on cement and 50% down the value chain (previous roadmap: 40%), as compared to 1990.
• By 2040: A 78% reduction in emissions from cement production, and 93% across the value chain.
• By 2050: With the ambition to reach net-zero emissions on cement by 2050, the sector has the potential to become carbon negative over the value chain.

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