The TecEco Tec-Kiln
If lime and magnesia were made without releases and much less energy then the production and use of major building materials such as cement would be much more sustainable
The Tec-Kiln has been designed for low temperature calcination of alkali metal carbonates and the pyro processing and simultaneous grinding of other minerals such as clays with the above objective in mind.
Hydraulic cements including binders TecEco invented can be made without releases and with much less energy and therefore at lower cost and TecEco are looking for funds to build the first prototype of the kiln.
Roman cements were made from lime and pozzolana (a volcanic ash containing significant quantities of SiO2 and Al2O3) or lime and ground brick and tiles. Learning from them it is possible to split the manufacture of Portland cement into the making of lime and the manufacture of clinker. In this way a lower, more precise amount of non fossil fuel energy can be untilised in a closed system that does not allow releases and much more consistent quality cements produced.
TecEco have demonstrated that reactive magnesia [1] is destined to become a major componenet of hydraulic and hydraulic/carbonating binders of the future and the diagram below depicts the role of the Tec-Kiln for the calcination of magnesite in the thermodynamic cycle of mangesium
Cement made without chemical releases has huge market potential as it represents a solution to the CO2 in the air problem without legacies that is potentially profitable and thus politically acceptable.
In the simplistic representation of the magnesium thermodynamic cycle shown below the TecEco kiln provides de carbonation of MgCO3.
Summary
The TecEco Tec-Kiln is an essential part of TecEco's grand plan to sequester massive amounts of CO2 as man made carbonate in the built environment and has the following features:
- Can be powered by various non fossil sources of energy such as intermittent solar or wind energy.
- Grinds and calcines at the same time thereby running 25% to 30% more efficiently.[2]
- Operates in a closed system and therefore does not release CO2 or other volatiles substances to the atmosphere
- The CO2 produced can be re-used for the production of man made carbonate as in the Gaia Engineering process.
- Products such as CaO and/or MgO made using the kiln can be used in carbonating binders to sequester CO2 as they become carbonates.
- Cement made with the Tec-Kiln are recyclable.
- Cement made with the Tec-Kiln should be eligible for carbon offsets.