Concrete production is a major source of carbon emissions, and the industry is under growing pressure to adopt sustainable practices.
Prairie Material turned to Concrete.ai for their Cicero 3 building project with Prologis. The task was clear: provide low-carbon concrete without sacrificing quality.
Concrete.ai collaborated with Prairie Material to implement a full-scale project using its Concrete Copilot platform. Of the 13,756 cubic yards (CYD) delivered, 13,700 CYD (99.6%) utilized Concrete Copilot mix designs, underscoring the platform’s value and efficiency.
This case study explores how Prairie utilized Concrete Copilot to meet the stringent sustainability requirements for its building project with Prologis, resulting in a new precedent for a greener and more resilient future in the construction industry.
Problem
Prologis set stringent low-carbon standards for the Cicero 3 project, challenging Prairie to deliver concrete that met these criteria without compromising performance. Prairie needed a sustainable and efficient mix design to comply with Prologis’ requirements.
Solution
Enter Concrete Copilot, a generative AI platform that streamlines traditional concrete mix design processes by tapping into a producer’s existing data.
Combining advanced algorithms with expert human judgment from the Prairie team, Concrete Copilot evaluated millions of mix designs to identify the optimal ones for Prairie’s needs, enhancing efficiency, reducing material costs, and lowering carbon footprints. Because carbon footprint is a design criterion integrated into Concrete Copilot, Prairie could quickly respond to Prologis’ requests for lower embodied carbon mixes.
Results
The concrete delivered not only met Prologis’ sustainability standards but also exhibited increased finishability and comparable set time performance, even in adverse winter conditions.
“The performance and strength of the concrete exceeded our expectations, achieving 156% of the design strength,” said Nick Beristain, Senior Manager of Technical Services at Prairie. “Now, we’re prepared with new mix designs for future projects, enabling us to rapidly respond to urgent needs with the most sustainable solutions. The process also allows for continuous optimization with future projects.”
Concrete.ai’s collaboration with Prairie demonstrates the effectiveness of using AI to further optimize concrete mix designs, meet sustainability requirements, and pave the way for a more sustainable future in construction.