OSU to lead creation of National Center for Sustainable Construction Materials
Monday, July 22, 2024
Media Contact: Tanner Holubar | Communications Specialist | 405-744-2065 | tanner.holubar@okstate.edu
The carbon footprint of human activities has received a tremendous amount of attention recently.
Global environmental issues have resulted in increased efforts to mitigate the amount of greenhouse gases being produced daily.
The U.S. government has prioritized reducing the embodied carbon of construction materials. Through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Bill, $160 million has been made available by the Environmental Protection Agency for national grants for efforts to reduce climate pollution.
Oklahoma State University’s College of Engineering, Architecture and Technology is embarking on a five-year project to lead the creation of the National Center for Sustainable Construction Materials.
OSU was selected for a $10 million grant from the EPA to partner with 10 other universities and the National Asphalt Pavement Association in promoting the use of low-carbon construction materials.
It is the largest grant that the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering has received in over a decade.
Dr. Deb Mishra, associate professor in CIVE, is the principal investigator and will serve as the center’s director. Mishra will oversee all administrative tasks of the center and will lead technical aspects of the project, focusing on asphalt materials.
The center aims to encourage construction material producers to generate Environmental Product Declarations, quantifying the materials’ environmental impacts. An EPD is a standardized document that details the environmental impact of a declared unit of a material. It is usually the output of a Life Cycle Assessment study that has been carried out on the material and currently focuses on the environmental impacts associated with raw material acquisition, transportation and production phases of a material.
“The objective behind this initiative is to ultimately establish a practice where the environmental impact of products is considered during procurement processes,” Mishra said. “However, if EPDs are to be considered as criteria during the procurement process, it is imperative that they are created using consistent methods that are transparent and are based on robust/reliable data.”
Interdisciplinary collaboration
The National Center for Sustainable Construction Materials will be a team effort between
multiple departments in CEAT.
Dr. Tyler Ley, regents professor in CIVE, will be the deputy director and assist with
administrative tasks and lead technical aspects related to concrete materials.
Dr. Mohamed Soliman, associate professor and Decker Dawson Chair in CIVE and director of the Bert Cooper Civil Engineering Laboratory, will oversee technical aspects related to structural steel.
Dr. Scott Frazier, associate professor in the School of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, will coordinate all outreach and training activities undertaken in the region by OSU for this project.
“The four of us worked very closely to develop this proposal and will be working together throughout the project’s duration to ensure the center functions as expected and we accomplish all the project objectives, establishing OSU as a national leader in this field,” Mishra said.
A postdoctoral research associate with a sustainability and life cycle analysis background will be recruited for day-to-day center management. There will be a dedicated space within CEAT where center staff will be located.
A national standard
The consortium for the center’s creation is made up of experts in construction materials, namely asphalt, concrete and structural steel.
The center’s objective is to encourage construction material producers to generate EPDs, and for state and local agencies to incorporate EPDs into their material selection and procurement processes.
Partners include the University of New Hampshire; University of North Carolina-Charlotte; Auburn University; University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; Langston University; University of Nevada-Reno; Oregon State University; University of Washington; University of Puerto Rico; and the University of Hawaii.
The partner universities’ locations give the project coverage over the entire country, with each university having strong ties to departments of transportation in their respective states and regions.
It will be impactful having each university work within its region to promote LCCMs, as each institution has strong connections to regional and state departments of transportation.
“In today’s day and age, a lot can be done through Teams and Zoom calls,” Mishra said. “However, a ‘boots on the ground’ approach is significantly more advantageous when we are trying to focus on something that requires a cultural change.”
The encouragement of EPDs for these types of construction materials will be done through education, creation of design tools, conversations with stakeholders and providing incentives to lower costs and risks in the industry to foster the necessary change for the EPDs to be adopted.
“The objective is to generate tools and educational materials that can be disseminated to stakeholders in each state for the different materials,” Mishra said.
There are no researchers currently involved with the project focusing on glass. The team may connect with glass researchers during the project to include them in the center’s scope.
“Our objective is to establish our center as a one-stop-shop for stakeholders in the construction materials industry and provide them with the necessary help so that they can take sustainability into consideration in their respective production practices,” Mishra said.
Providing training
Each university will serve as a Center of Excellence for EPDs, working with material producers, contractors, DOTs and other stakeholders to promote the use of EPDs.
All center activities will be headquartered at OSU, and educational materials and design tools will be created by all partnering universities. Eight universities will do so for asphalt, four universities will focus on concrete and OSU will focus on all three materials (asphalt, concrete and structural steel).
All universities will promote LCCMs in their respective regions, even if an individual university may focus on only technical aspects related to one material.
“What we are trying to accomplish through these projects and the generic field of low-carbon construction materials marks a change in the thinking and decision-making process,” Mishra said. “When you think of a typical engineering procurement process, the traditional approach has been to focus on function, safety and cost. What is now being proposed is that we should include the ‘sustainability’ leg into the material selection and procurement process.”
An advisory board will be established with representatives from each university, National
Asphalt Paving Association, National Ready Mix Concrete Association, American Institute
of Steel Construction and representatives from state DOTs.
The center will look to establish a program for EPD assistance grants for construction
materials producers to help offset the cost of collecting data and verification of
EPDs and associated LCAs. Funds would only be provided to those who complete required
training modules and adopt low-carbon materials.
A repository/website will be set up to store all EPDs generated through the project. This website will also house all training materials, instructional videos, and design tools created by the center and will be freely accessible worldwide. It will be shared and cross-listed with as many other publicly available databases as possible.
A key to generating more EPDs is training workers in the construction industry, as it will require a change in practices by each part of a construction team. If each construction crew member understands the benefit of low-carbon materials, it is a more well-rounded approach than just alerting manufacturers of the benefits of LCCMs. Implementing a widespread use of EPDs will take time and practice.
OSU will host annual workshops where national organizations will train representatives from all universities and partners involved in this research to discuss training that can be used nationwide.
Training materials and activities will then be created to educate stakeholders, and activities will be designed to engage K-12 students in summer camps on the importance of low-carbon construction materials.
The goal is to host 10 summer camps per year for K-12 teachers and students, with Dr. Jovette Dew, director of outreach programs for CEAT, coordinating the camps.
Langston University will help establish internship opportunities for students from underrepresented groups as well as help recruit students for graduate and undergraduate research positions.
To showcase the importance of low-carbon materials to producers, design tools will be created for asphalt and concrete to meet economic, performance and sustainability goals. Performance-based testing on these low-carbon materials will take place when materials are produced and checked for quality control.
More EPDs on asphalt, concrete, structural steel, and mixed additives are among the project’s overall goals. EPDs vary across the industry, by state and across the country, so facilitating a standard for them is essential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions using low-carbon construction materials.
Having a consortium made up of some of the world’s leading experts in their field is a significant strength of the project.
“We did not just pick universities to represent a geographically diverse population,” Mishra said. “We worked with faculty members who are internationally recognized for their work in construction materials. We strongly believe our team’s composition is our main strength as we undertake this exciting project.”
Photos by: Kristi Wheeler and Dr. Deb Mishra
Story by: Tanner Holubar | IMPACT Magazine