Article: Composites in Buildi

Composites in Building, Construction & Infrastructure can Double the Global Polymer Market Demand

Kokel, Nicolas

9/10/2022 12:00 AM

Credit: tuf-bar.com

This article was originally posted on Linkedin on 14^th Aug, 2020

The Petrochemical Sector Trap

Figure 1: Building construction | Credit: Drazen_/iStock

Facing diminishing growth rates of chemical and polymer products and an attrition in fuel demand growth due to slow but relentless replacement of petroleum fuels in the transportation sector with electric battery vehicles the petrochemical industry is struggling to discover new outlets and create new markets for its products.

Yet there exists a huge, practically uncharted application territory, which penetration will unlock a massive usage of petroleum-based products in polymer composite applications.

What are we talking about and how comes that such a profound market potential as been hiding in plain sight but remains mostly untapped? The answer lies in the backward technological development of the building, construction and infrastructure markets, lending themselves to substantial replacement of structural materials employed from concrete and metals with carbon-based composite materials.

A Backward Construction Sector

Figure 2: Index of US labour productiviy | Source: WEF - Shaping the Future of Construction

The Engineering & Construction (E&C) Sector has been slower to adopt and adapt to new technologies than any other global sectors and overall productivity in the sector has remained nearly flat for the last 50 years, The Boston Consulting Group reports in a 2016 study prepared in collaboration with the World Economic Forum. The report also highlights that the industry has vast potential, however, for improving productivity and efficiency, thanks to digitization, innovative technologies and new construction techniques.

Considering the rapid emergence of augmented reality, drones, 3D scanning and printing, Building Information Modelling (BIM), autonomous equipment and advanced building materials – all of them having now reached market maturity, any improvement in productivity and successful adoption of modern innovative processes will have a major impact, the report continues.

Building & Construction Materials

Iron and concrete have been the structural mainstay of the construction sector since the mid of the 19th century when reinforced concrete was invented in the midst of the industrial revolution, but no much technological progress has been made since then with the same slowly evolving structural materials and construction techniques still used today.

Figure 3: Concrete Preparation | Credit: www.dorner.at

Let us now take a look at the numbers.

Figure 4: Cement, Sand, Aggregate | Credit: engineeringdiscoveries.com

Cement - The global cement demand estimate for 2020 is 4,370 million tonnes (4.37 billion tonnes), which is about 10 times more than the estimated global production of synthetic polymers, fibres and rubbers in 2020 (420 million tonnes).

Construction Aggregates - While cement typically makes 7 to 15 vol-% of a concrete composition, the content of construction aggregate varies in a 60 to 80 vol-% range with the balance being made of water (14 to 18 vol-%) and air (2 to 8 vol-%). Although I could not retrieve any recent market data about the global demand for construction aggregates the extrapolation of the Freedonia Group global demand estimate to 2015 as reported by Concrete Construction leads up to a demand of round 60 billion tonnes by 2020. Since the construction aggregate demand continued to grow at a similar CAGR of 5.4% over the recent years that is comparable to the growth rate of the previous period we shall assume that our 60 billion tonnes estimate is a fair assumption and good enough number for our purpose.

Figure 5: Extrapolated from: Freedonia Group, 2012's Global Demand Estimate to 2015

Concrete - The total consumption of cement and construction aggregates is summing up to about 65 billion tons, or above 150 times the tonnage of the total synthetic polymers, fibres and rubbers (420 million tonnes) produced in a year.

Steel - The steel demand was 1,775 million tonnes (1.8 billion tons) in 2019 with some of this demand for the use in structural building, construction and infrastructure elements and parts or for steel rebar. So let's keep the total of cement, construction aggregates and steel at 66 billion tonnes.

Density of materials

The typical density of concrete is 2.4 kg/l and the density of steel is in a range from 7.8 to 8 kg/l.

By contrast the typical density of a fibreglass composite comprising 70 wt-% fibreglass is 1.8kg/l and the typical density of a carbon fibre composite with the same 70 wt-% of carbon fibre is 1.52 kg/l.

Replacement of concrete and steel with polymer composites

Figure 6: FRP Pilings - Credit: CompositesWorld, Photo | Scott Francis

What would it take to double the global demand for polymers by replacing concrete (and some steel) to add roughly another 500 million tonnes of polymers?

In case of fibreglass, 500 million tonnes correspond to the 30 wt-% fraction of resin binder in the fibreglass composite, for a total amount of 1.67 billion tonnes of composite materials.

If carbon fibres manufacturing could be deployed at scale (considering it is still today only a 100 thousand tonnes market facing major engineering upscaling limitations), since the carbon fibres are also produced from fossil feedstock, the total polymer composite amount would be somewhat lower compared with fibreglass, but this remains so far a highly speculative scenario.

We now need to make an assumption regarding the replacement of concrete with fibreglass reinforced polymer composites since it may not be a simple one-to-one replacement by volume but with new design techniques such as modular construction design with pultruded or molded parts, one volume unit of composite could possibly replace 2 to 3 volume units of concrete. At a density ratio of 2.4:1.8 or 1.33 and a volume replacement ratio of 2.5:1 the total concrete amount to be displaced shall come at about 1.67 billion tonnes x (1.33 x 2.5) = 1.67 x 3.325 = 5.55 billion tonnes of concrete or 8.5% of the present concrete market.

Figure 7: Credit: Composites Today,
Road Bridge Made Using FRP Composites

Figure 8: Credit:
Melton^™️ Classics Incorporated, Fiberglass Columns

A not so Unreasonable Scenario

Based on the above assumptions, in a 65 billion tonnes concrete market in 2020 and assuming continued 5% annual growth rate, the total concrete market shall add another 65 billion tonnes by 2031 and thus composite materials should displace 8.5% of the incremental concrete market every year to 2035 to add another 500 million tonnes of polymers and resins in a year in order to double the present polymer market size.

Does this scenario make sense? Please vet my assumptions and calculations and add your comments to this article.

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