Microsoft is paying for green cement

Michelle Ma, reporting for Bloomberg:

Microsoft Corp. is partnering with Sublime Systems to reduce its indirect greenhouse gas emissions through a first-of-a-kind deal to buy low-carbon cement products from the startup.

Under the contract, Microsoft can purchase up to 622,500 metric tons of Sublime’s cement over a period of six to nine years. Microsoft can claim the carbon reductions associated with that cement in its own emissions accounting, even if it doesn’t use the material itself. If Microsoft passes on buying the product, the Somerville, Massachusetts-based Sublime can sell it to local buyers but the software giant still gets to claim the carbon savings.

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Sublime will start delivering on its deal with Microsoft when its first 30,000-ton commercial plant is operational. It’s slated to be completed in 2027.

All tech giants in the AI race should be buying green cement and green steel, right now. Unlike expanding or restarting nuclear power plants, they don’t have to buy green cement and steel for their data centres, but they should.

For the current state of green cement, this is a huge deal. Microsoft’s commitment is equivalent to more than 20 years’ worth of output from Sublime’s first commercial plant. But in the context of conventional cement, this is less than the annual output of just one typical plant. There is still plenty of room for scale.