Next Generation SCM Limited

Human rights violated by Swiss inaction on climate, ECHR rules in landmark case

ramiz — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 14:19:38 +0000

Weak government climate policies violate fundamental human rights, the European court of human rights has ruled.

In a landmark decision on one of three major climate cases, the first such rulings by an international court, the ECHR raised judicial pressure on governments to stop filling the atmosphere with gases that make extreme weather more violent.

The court’s top bench ruled that Switzerland had violated the rights of a group of older Swiss women to family life, but threw out a French mayor’s case against France and that of a group of young Portuguese people against 32 European countries.

“It feels like a mixed result because two of the cases were inadmissible,” said Corina Heri, a law researcher at the University of Zürich. “But actually it’s a huge success.”

The court, which calls itself “the conscience of Europe”, found that Switzerland had failed to comply with its duties to stop climate change. It also set out a path for organisations to bring further cases on behalf of applicants.

The Swiss verdict opens up all 46 members of the Council of Europe to similar cases in national courts that they are likely to lose.

Joie Chowdhury, an attorney at the Centre for International Environmental Law campaign group, said the judgment left no doubt that the climate crisis was a human rights crisis. “We expect this ruling to influence climate action and climate litigation across Europe and far beyond,” she said.

The facts of the three cases varied widely, but they all hinged on the question of whether government inaction on climate change violated fundamental human rights. Some of the governments argued that the cases should not be admitted, and that climate policy should be the subject of national governments rather than international courts.

The plaintiffs attending the hearing in the court in Strasbourg, some as young as 12, celebrated after a member of a panel of 17 judges read out the verdicts. The climate activist Greta Thunberg joined a gathering outside the court before the hearing to encourage faster action.

Anton Foley, who with Thunberg was representing Aurora, a youth group that filed a climate lawsuit against Sweden, said it was “unjust” that responsibility for stopping the climate crisis fell on young people, and praised the Swiss women for stepping up. “We don’t want to be the hope for the older generation. We want them to do this, because we don’t want to fight this fight.”

Thunberg thanked Rosmarie Wydler-Wälti, co-president of the KlimaSeniorinnen, for what she had done, as they met outside the courtroom.

The KlimaSeniorinnen, a group of 2,400 older Swiss women, told the court that several of their rights were being violated. Because older women are more likely to die in heatwaves – which have become hotter and more common because of fossil fuels – they argued that Switzerland should do its share to stop the planet heating by the Paris agreement target of 1.5C (2.7F) above preindustrial levels.

The court ruled that Swiss authorities had not acted in time to come up with a good enough strategy to cut emissions. It also found the applicants had not had appropriate access to justice in Switzerland.

But it also rejected the cases of four individual applicants who had joined the KlimaSeniorinnen.

“I’m very happy,” said Nicole Barbry, 70, a member of the KlimaSeniorinnen who had come to Strasbourg. “It’s good that they’re finally listening to us.”

The Portuguese children and young people – who because of their age will see greater climate damage than previous generations – argued that climate-fuelled disasters such as wildfires and smoke threatened their right to life and discriminated against them based on their age.

The court did not admit the case, deciding that the applicants could not bring cases against countries other than Portugal and adding that they had not pursued legal avenues in Portugal against the government.

“Their [the Swiss] win is a win for us, too,” said Sofia Oliveira, a 19-year-old applicant in the Portuguese case. “And a win for everyone.”

The French case, brought by the MEP Damien Carême, argued that France’s failure to do enough to stop climate change violated his rights to life and privacy and family life. Carême filed the case when he was the mayor of Grand-Synthe, a coastal town vulnerable to flooding. The court did not admit the case because Carême no longer lives there.

The ECHR rejects about 90% of all applications it receives as inadmissible but fast-tracked the three climate cases to its top bench because of their urgency. It delayed hearings on six more climate cases to get a result on the rulings on Tuesday.

The rulings will influence three other international courts that are examining the role of government climate policy on human rights.

Charlotte Blattner, a researcher at the University of Berne who specialises in climate law, said the court had delivered a bold judgment in favour of a viable future. “The nature and gravity of the threat of climate change – and the urgency to effectively respond to it – require that governments can and will have to be held accountable for their lack of adequate action,” she said.

The court said that keeping global heating to 1.5C was a key part of protecting human rights, rather than the higher 2C limit that courts had used for rulings on cases in Germany and the Netherlands.

Gerry Liston, a lawyer for the Portuguese children, said the recognition that Switzerland’s policies were not science-based was “by far” the most significant aspect of the ruling. “No European government’s climate policies are aligned with anything near 1.5C, so it will be clear to those working on climate litigation in those countries that there is now a clear basis to bring a case in their national courts.”

Most polluting cements ruled out in Irish public procurement

ramiz — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 14:19:38 +0000

Highly polluting cements are to be ruled out of public sector projects in Ireland from September, due to new government public procurement rules.

The new rules include a number of key provisions designed to drive down emissions from cement and concrete – including requirements to:

drive down the main source of CO2 in cement, clinker, by 30 per cent, and avoid high carbon CEM I cements
require Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) when procuring cement and concrete
avoid the over-specification of materials
carry out whole life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions assessments for new infrastructure projects and buildings above certain budget thresholds – with the thresholds tightening over a phased timeline from 2024-2026.

The Minister for Enterprise, Peter Burke, will write to public bodies in the coming weeks to advise them of the new guidance.

The mandated 30 per cent target for clinker reduction is a European first for Ireland. A mix of limestone and minerals heated in kilns to temperatures of circa 1450C, clinker is the source of over 90 per cent of emissions from cement. In Ireland, cement currently averages almost 85 per cent clinker.

Dublin-based Ecocem, Europe’s leading provider of low carbon cement solutions, welcomed the announcement as a significant shift that sends a clear message to the construction industry to invest in low carbon products.

Ecocem director of public affairs and sustainability, Susan McGarry, said: “The cement sector is responsible for almost 5 per cent of Ireland’s emissions, and has a major role to play in decarbonising the construction industry. Public procurement requirements on the use of low carbon cement are essential to ensure sustainable delivery of Ireland’s infrastructure. At Ecocem, we have long been calling for mandatory use of low carbon cements, which have enormous potential to reduce emissions at scale. The government’s mandatory target of 30 per cent reduction in clinker is a solid start on which we as an industry can build.

“Low carbon cement technology is available to be deployed immediately, offering a scalable, cost-efficient solution to cement and concrete’s carbon problem. The responsibility now lies with public sector decision-makers to engage with the private sector in its efforts to reduce the carbon impact of construction.”

The announcement from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment (DETE) followed the publication of the report “Reducing embodied carbon in cement and concrete through Public Procurement in Ireland”, which details detailing technical and procedural recommendations for public procurement including:

Reducing the carbon impact of public sector projects involving construction
Reducing the carbon impact of the procurement of cement and concrete
Doing more with less by using less concrete and less cement and by designing, specifying, and managing products on site better.

The report was commissioned by DETE on behalf of the Cement and Construction Sector Decarbonisation Working Group.

The report was produced by RPS Consultancy services, project lead, together with RKD architects and EY, providing additional expertise in product specifications and economic analysis respectively.

The report provides a technical and high-quality analysis, based on international experience, knowledge of the sector, and extensive stakeholder engagement. It outlines the consultants’ technical and procedural recommendations as to their recommended public procurement approach required, to both impactfully reduce the carbon impact of public sector projects involving construction, and the procurement of cement and concrete, and to motivate the cement sector to invest in the production of decarbonised product.

Industry emissions in Ireland account for roughly 10 per cent of national Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions. Under the Sectoral Emissions Ceilings, the Minister of Enterprise has responsibility to reduce emissions from industry by 20 per cent by 2025 and 35 per cent by 2030.

Under Climate Action Plan 2021, DETE established the cross-departmental Cement and Construction Sector Decarbonisation Working Group. Its members include Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage (DHLHG), Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications (DECC), Department of Finance, Office of Government Procurement (OGP), Office of Public Works (OPW), Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI), Enterprise Ireland, Department of the Taoiseach, the Land Development Agency, Irish Green Building Council, and others. The working group progresses a ‘multi-pronged’ approach to motivating and facilitating the cement and construction sector to decarbonises. Activities include detailed engagement with the cement sector through Enterprise Ireland, engagement with research on innovation in the formulation and production of cement and concrete products, alignment with the Timber in Construction Steering Group, Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) policy, and policy measures to increase circularity in the construction sector, and re-use of cement and concrete products where possible.

The guidance to public bodies will be provided in the coming weeks, and require that, for projects commencing design from September 2024:

public bodies should seek an Environmental Product Declaration, to an EN 15804 standard, or equivalent, when directly procuring cement or concrete products
public bodies should be guided by best-practice carbon management design approaches, including avoidance of over-specification of materials, when undertaking or procuring construction projects
high-carbon CEM I cement products should not be procured by public bodies, or used in publicly produced construction projects, except where a technical justification is made.
concrete products procured by public bodies, or used in publicly produced construction projects, including poured or pre-cast products, should in general specify a minimum of 30 per cent clinker replacement, consistent with IS EN 206, except where a technical justification is made
public bodies procuring infrastructure projects (construction other than buildings) in receipt of exchequer funding in excess of €60 million, should produce or procure a Whole Life-Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions assessment for their project. From 1 January 2026, projects in receipt of exchequer funding in excess of €10 million should produce such an assessment. Projects below this scale should also consider implementing this assessment
from 1 September 2025, public bodies that are commencing design for new buildings for projects in receipt of exchequer funding in excess of €10 million in the case of non-residential buildings, or in excess of €60 million in the case of residential buildings, should produce or procure a Whole Life-Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions assessment in accordance technical guidance to be provided by SEAI in 2025. From 1 June 2026, projects in receipt of exchequer funding in excess of €5 million in the case of non-residential buildings, or more than €30 million in the case of residential buildings, should produce such an assessment. Projects below this scale should also consider implementing this assessment.

British-Saudi JV to establish low carbon SCM factory in the Kingdom

ramiz — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 14:19:11 +0000

Nizak Mining Company, fully owned by Saudi -listed City Cement, has entered into a joint venture (JV) with UK-based low carbon supplementary cementitious material (SCM) producer Next Generation SCM to produce low carbon concrete in the Kingdom.

The JV will be the first producer of premium calcined clay SCM in Saudi Arabia, according to a joint press statement.

The statement didn’t disclose investment details but said the JV’s first factory will be built in Riyadh, with the aim to begin production by the third quarter of 2025. It will have an annual production target of 350,000 tonnes in the first year, and 700,000 tonnes in the second year.

The statement said the Next Generation SCM and City Cement JV will introduce Danish company CemGreen’s CemTower technology in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) market.

It said in Denmark, the technology is able to produce calcined clay while generating only 8 kilos of CO2 per tonne, which is a 99 percent reduction compared to the IEA average of 600 kilograms per tonne for cement.

The statement also claimed that the use of premium calcined clay SCM made by the JV can reduce the carbon emissions from standardised concrete by up to 58 percent. Traditional alternatives to SCM include fly ash from coalfired energy production and slag from steel production, which are not produced locally in Saudi Arabia.

Neil Crompton, British Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, commented: “This joint venture will be a first for Saudi Arabia, producing Sustainable Cementitious Materials that will contribute to a significant reduction in environmental emissions, and facilitate a Vision 2030 goal of sustainable infrastructure development for Saudi Arabia’.