Sources: Associated Builders and Contractors, Washington, D.C.; CP staff The Department of Labor’s flawed method of calculating “prevailing wages” under the 91-year-old Davis-Bacon Act adds at least 7.2 percent to the cost of federal and federally assisted construction projects and inflates wages by 20.2 percent compared to local market averages, according to a new report from the Beacon Hill Institute,…
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Eco Material harvests ash, forges business and government alliances
Sources: Eco Material Technologies Inc., South Jordan, Utah; CP staff Since an early-2022 launch as Boral Resources and Green Cement successor, Eco Material Technologies has secured its core ASTM C618 fly ash marketing and distribution business, while moving quickly on new opportunities: Harvested coal combustion ash and high value supplementary cementitious material (SCM) processing.
Read MoreContractors’ annual workforce development tally exceeds $1.5 billion
Source: Associated Builders and Contractors, Washington, D.C. Associated Builders and Contractors members invested $1.6 billion to provide more than 1.3 million course attendees with craft, leadership and safety education in 2021, according to the group’s 2022 Workforce Development Survey, up from $1.3 billion in 2020. The annual assessment quantifies the scope of ABC member workforce development initiatives to advance employee…
Read MoreACI Foundation funds UHPC, SCM, concrete specimen research
Sources: American Concrete Institute Foundation, Farmington Hills, Mich.; CP staff Among 10 projects receiving 2022 ACI Foundation Concrete Research Council grants, two address ultra-high performance concrete: “Maximum Reinforcing Ratio for Reinforced UHPC Beams: Towards Slender Elements,” under principal investigator Yi Shao, University of California, Berkeley; and, “Shear Behavior of UHPC Considering Axial Load Effects,” under Dimitrios Kalliontzis, University of Houston.…
Read MoreI-XL joins King Klinker thin brick master distributors Acme, Consolidated, Reuther
Sources: I-XL Building Products, Vancouver, B.C.; CP staff A strategic partnership with Wisconsin-based King Klinker America positions I-XL Building Products as Master Distributor for King Klinker thin brick veneer plus companion Advanced Formliners seamless concrete embedded brick formliners and Speedymason thin brick or stone panel solutions.
Read MoreReport measures structural precast versus C-I-P concrete, steel
Sources: Freedonia Group, Cleveland; CP staff Structural building components lead annual precast shipments and are on pace to exhibit nearly 6 percent annual growth over the next five years, according to “Precast Concrete Products,” a new analysis from market researcher Freedonia Group. When specified for slabs, columns, foundations, or full building systems, precast concrete reduces costs in certain construction conditions…
Read MoreMultinational cement players team to back six carbon management consortia
Sources: Global Cement and Concrete Association, London; CP staff An unprecedented research, development and commercialization project under the Global Cement and Concrete Association aligns multinational producers and proprietors of technologies aimed at streamlining or capturing and utilizing carbon dioxide emissions from cement plants or other major industrial sources. The project teams permutations of major European, Latin American and Asian cement…
Read MoreHeidelbergCement invests in maturity sensor technology developer
Sources: HeidelbergCement AG, Germany; CP staff Lehigh Hanson Inc. parent HeidelbergCement has taken a strategic minority stake in Ottawa-based Giatec, whose proprietary sensors equip producers and their customers to monitor concrete maturity in real time. Combined with artificial intelligence algorithms, configured to integrate with a wide range of concrete industry software solutions, the sensor data informs cement optimization, quality control,…
Read MoreMapei brands 3D printing ink in partnership with Black Buffalo
Sources: Black Buffalo 3D Corp., New York; CP staff A recently formed strategic research, development, and manufacturing partnership involving Nexcon 3D construction printer provider Black Buffalo and admixture supplier Mapei Corp. has released Planitop 3D, a packaged, cement-based ink/mortar. The launch times with a project spelling significant initial scale: Affordable-home builder Alquist 3D will use a Nexcon printer and Planitop…
Read MoreSika colloidal silica agent arms contractors to control slab destiny
Sources: Sika Corp.,Lyndhurst, N.J.; CP staff Nanotechnology driving deployment of particles far smaller than those typical of cementitious materials augments the latest addition to Sika’s line of concrete admixtures for improving slab on grade performance. A colloidal silica topical agent, SikaCem-190 Concrete Control is spray applied during floating or troweling to maintain adequate moisture and reduce premature set risk. The…
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