When you look across the urban landscape you realize that one material stands out above all others, be it commercial and residential facilities, bridges, tunnels, or roads, our modern cities are built with cement. The total volume of cement production worldwide amounted to an estimated 4.1 billion tons in 2020, almost three times more than the 1.39 billion tons produced 25 years before. The constant demand for this essential building material is driven by continued population growth and urbanization trends that have made cement the second most consumed commodity in the world after water. So, what if we could power our buildings and cities with this abundant material? That is the goal of researchers at the Division of Building Technology, within the Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering, at Chalmers University of Technology, in Gothenburg, Sweden. In a 2021 study led by Emma Qingnan Zhang and Luping Tang, a rechargeable cement-based battery was developed, with […]