Cementipedia

An In-Progress People's Encyclopedia of Cement

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"ASR" Auto Shredder Residue - the non-steel parts of a vehicle. ASR is composed of plastics, rubber, foam, residual metal pieces, paper, fabric, glass, sand, and dirt (EPA, 2008; USCAR, 2008). It is also termed “auto fluff,” "fluff" or “auto shredder fluff.” Older vehicles can host PCBs and mercury in their switches and asbestos in their brakes.

2006 Calif. EPA report on auto fluff as cement fuel (578 KB)

2006 Science Digest article on auto fluff as fuel (346 KB)

EPA's 2010 Material Characterization Paper for auto fluff (58 KB)

Summary of Florida USA cement kiln test burn of ASR, or Fluff (2021 KB)

"Alternative Fuels" - See also "Co-Processing." Any fuel not coal or natural gas. Most often used by industry to refer to human-made wastes, such as plastics, chemical or refinery wastes, or even used shingles,  but it can also include bio-fuels such as Switchgrass and wood chips. The switching to Alternative Fuels is often justified by industry as a way to reduce global warming gases.

USEPA 2008 Trends in Alternative Fuels in the Cement Industry (2772 KB)

Excerpts from EPA 2008 Draft Report on Alternative Fules (124 KB)

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Bio-Fuels:
            
                 Biomass as cement kiln fuel in Brazil                 

                 Biomass as cement kiln fuel in India
  
                 Cement plants and algae

                 Landfill methane fuels Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA cement kiln

                 Cement plants burning sewer sludge: human health risks
                 Cement plants burning sewer sludge: cost-benefit analysis

                 Coal plants using switchgrass

                 Canadian cement plant switches from tires to biofuels
             
                    

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Co-Processing - See also "Alternative Fuels." Term favored in EU countries to refer to the practice of burning hazardous and "non-hazardous" wastes in cement kilns.

Cement Kiln Portal - Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA) groundworks web site devoted to international cement plant pollution issues. 


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"Danger Downwind" - The American Lung Association produced this 16-minute film in 1995. It focuses on the burning of hazardous wastes at TXI's cement plant in Midlothian, Texas and includes interviews with area doctors, residents, activists and experts. Downwinders founder Sue Pope is featured. One of the few films about cement kiln incineration of hazardous wastes that we know about.

"Danger Downwind" Part 1 (8 minutes)
"Danger Downwind" Part 2  (7:40 minutes)


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Emission Inventory - any annual collection of pollution data from a source. Most often used in regulatory agencies to refer to annual totals of pollution from point sources, or specific facilities, such as cement plants, refineries, or utility boilers.  In Texas and other states, there are annual emission inventories collected by state agencies from all point sources for the five "primary pollutants" of the federal Clean Air Act: Nitrogen Oxide, Sulfuric Dioxide, Carbon Monoxide, Particulate Matter and Lead. The data comes from real time monitoring or estimates based on formulas accounting to input and efficiency, depending on the facility. It can then be broken down by county, as well as the name of the facility. Usually the data base can be one to two years behind the current year in reporting annual numbers.

At the federal level in the U.S., there's also the "Toxic Release Inventory," or TRI, compiled by EPA. It too is a collection of annual self-submitted data from thousands of point sources, or specific facilities, from every state in the union estimating how much of what chemicals EPA officially classifies as "toxic" they released. Since there is very rarely real time monitoring for the hundreds of txics potentially produced by a facility, TRI totals are based on estimates of formulas that may or may not reflect what's actually happenin at the plant site.  TRI Explorer is a tool that can be used by citizens online to look up information within the TRI database by year, zip code, name of facility, type of facility, etc.

"Not Just Steam"  - In the summer of 2008 Amanda Caldwell and Susan Waskey, two University of North Texas Geography graduate students, did something no one had previously done. They added up all the emission reports submitted to state and federal government by the three cement plants and adjacent steel mill in Midlothian, Texas. Their report, “Midlothian Industrial Plant Emission Data” was the first to try to document the cumulative impact from what is the largest concentration of smokestack industries in North Texas.  Although there has been an operating cement plant in Midlothian since 1960, emission data was only available from the state beginning in 1990, and from the EPA beginning in 1988. The last available data from both sources is currently 2006.

Emission Inventory Data Base for the state of Texas
Toxic Release Inventory of EPA
Intro to EPA's TRI Explorer site

Not Just Steam (66 KB)

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"Not Just Steam"  - In the summer of 2008 Amanda Caldwell and Susan Waskey, two University of North Texas Geography graduate students, did something no one had previously done. They added up all the emission reports submitted to state and federal government by the three cement plants and adjacent steel mill in Midlothian, Texas. Their report, “Midlothian Industrial Plant Emission Data” was the first to try to document the cumulative impact from what is the largest concentration of smokestack industries in North Texas.  Although there has been an operating cement plant in Midlothian since 1960, emission data was only available from the state beginning in 1990, and from the EPA beginning in 1988. The last available data from both sources is currently 2006.

Not Just Steam (66 KB)

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