Future-proof pathways to cleaner cement

Carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) is expected to play a leading role in the decarbonisation of cement. The Global Cement and Concrete Association (GCCA) has positioned CCUS as a cornerstone of its roadmap to net-zero, with carbon capture delivering the highest share of emissions reductions, against all other measures, by 2050.¹ However, for cement manufacturers now evaluating business cases for CCUS, early adoption remains fraught with commercial uncertainty.  

Conventional carbon capture technologies aimed at cement are designed as discrete, single purpose solutions – they capture CO₂, at cost. The potential value created by these technologies is heavily dependent on enabling factors within the broader CCUS value chain: transport and storage infrastructure, public subsidy, regulatory support and market incentives. An end-to-end CCUS project involves a lot of moving parts, raising project risk and uncertainty.    

To scale carbon capture in cement, manufacturers need optionality. A cement plant needs flexibility in when and how it will deploy CCUS. Technologies should offer multiple sources of value to the cement plants that adopt them, and be adaptable to the complex and evolving challenges that the industry faces. Ideally, a manufacturer would draw on multiple levers over time to decarbonise economically. 

The Leilac technology offers a multi-pronged approach to decarbonisation in cement. Leilac’s core indirect heating process is adaptable to the unique and often contrasting needs of individual cement plants. Leilac’s ‘capture-ready’ capability could offer the cement and lime industries a de-risked approach to decarbonisation.  

Indirect heating – a future-proof solution  

The Leilac technology is an emergent process technology that aims to provide the Best Available Technique for the calcination step in existing cement plants. Proven at a multi-tonne-per-hour rate at the Leilac-1 pilot in Belgium, the Leilac process utilises a unique indirect heating method to calcine limestone or cement raw meal. The technology is being designed to enable multiple advantages, including the low-cost capture of unavoidable CO₂ emissions, lower and even optimised energy costs, new revenues, and enhanced productivity.  

For cement plants navigating changing market conditions, indirect heating could provide flexible, future-proof strategies for low-carbon and low-cost cement production. The Leilac technology is, in part, a carbon capture solution, but it is also an innovative cement production process. The reduced operating costs and new revenues that indirect heating may unlock are designed to create immediate business cases for technology adoption. Importantly, these benefits are not contingent on the immediate availability of a CCUS value chain, public subsidy, or other policy incentive. Not only would this support the deployment of capture-ready plants, but it could decouple the deployment of carbon capture technologies from carbon transport and storage infrastructure, thereby reducing project complexity and risk. 

How does it work?  

In conventional cement and lime calcination, unavoidable process CO₂ emissions become entrained within flue gases, before being routed to the stack and released into the atmosphere. The CO₂ released from this process accounts for between 60 and 65% of a cement or lime plant’s facility-wide CO₂ emissions.  

In contrast, indirect heating works by keeping the released process CO₂ separate from flue gases and air. The heat source and the calcination process are physically isolated from one another via an inner alloy tube. The raw material is fed to this inner tube, whilst a combustion system and/or an electricity source externally heats the tube’s walls. The released CO₂ is then routed to an independent offtake, at high purity (proven at 98%), ready for use or storage. This CO₂ offtake stream can be either offline or online, depending on the availability of downstream carbon management infrastructure and market incentives.  

Fuel switching, energy flexibility and near-term benefits 

Leilac’s unique indirect heating configuration creates a high degree of flexibility over the energy sources that can be used to drive the calcination reaction. The Leilac-1 pilot is powered by natural gas heating. The Leilac-2 demonstration plant is designed to enable near full use of lower-cost, lower carbon alternative fuel. Multiple operational pilot projects have proven the technology’s ability to deliver fully electric calcination, which could avoid fuel emissions entirely.  

In its next generation of designs, Leilac is developing its ability to deliver hybrid-fuel operations. This technology innovation aims to enable operators to dynamically switch between energy sources – whilst delivering continuous heat to maintain stable production. This could deliver two potential benefits. 

First, producers could minimise energy costs. Hybrid heating is designed to respond to daily and seasonal energy price fluctuations, empowering producers to switch to the lowest cost of energy locally available. For example, hybrid-fuel operations may enable a cement plant to capitalise on periods of low or negatively priced electricity, while remaining protected from periods of high electricity prices or unexpected shocks to fuel markets. In short, it is designed to enable flexible and optimised energy strategies that maximise the opportunities volatile markets present, whilst mitigating risks. 

Second, producers could unlock new revenues. The potential of a hybrid-fuelled technology to rapidly increase or decrease its electricity use makes it well suited for grid balancing activities. The electrical baseload introduced by a hybrid Leilac plant would create significant a source of demand-side flexibility. This energy flexibility could be provided as a balancing reserve to regional power grids and create a valuable new revenue stream for cement plants. 

Dynamic fuel switching may therefore deliver both immediate economic benefits and reduced carbon emissions. At the same time, it provides future-proof optionality for energy inputs and process emissions capture.  

Navigating CCUS uncertainty 

“Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future.” 

 – Niels Bohr (physicist, Nobel laureate).  

In the conventional CCUS business case, the value created by capturing CO₂ from cement is contingent on a number of enabling factors, both now and into the future. However, the magnitude and timing of these future enablers remains somewhat uncertain.  

In 2024, The EU’s Industrial Carbon Management Strategy mapped a preliminary outline of a pan-European CCUS infrastructure network (figure 1). In 2025, the EU Commission allocated €250 million to support the initial stages of its development² However, such infrastructure is likely to take many years to construct and commission. 

Although emissions trading schemes and other carbon pricing mechanisms continue to grow in both reach and value across the globe^3,4, recent economic downturns have led to carbon price volatility, adding uncertainty to the near-term value decarbonisation projects can expect to unlock from this incentive.⁵ 

Conventional CCUS technologies fail to offer protection against the types of commercial uncertainties outlined above. Ideally, decarbonisation solutions aimed at cement will be more flexible and multi-purposed, providing strong benefits to producers in the near term and across divergent future scenarios.

The capture-ready approach  

By delivering immediate business cases for technology adoption that are independent of carbon pricing or downstream carbon management infrastructure, Leilac aims to deploy ‘capture-ready’ installations. Such an approach could offer significant advantages over the typical end-to-end CCUS business case.  

A capture-ready cement plant could gain first-mover advantage in the CCUS value chain 

Traditional CCUS projects face a chicken and egg dilemma. The commercial viability of conventional carbon capture deployment depends on the availability of downstream transport and storage infrastructure. However, the development of carbon management infrastructure is dependent on there being sufficient carbon to manage. 

Leilac’s capture-ready approach aims to solve this dilemma by providing a de-risked, first steps approach towards CCUS network integration for cement. CCUS infrastructure could expand in the direction of capture-ready cement manufacturers. Meanwhile, plants could benefit from Leilac’s other advantages whilst they wait for said infrastructure to be constructed. This capability is in lockstep with the recently announced EU Carbon Management Strategy.  

“Early adopters, such as CO₂ capture and storage project developers, could play a vital role in shaping the CO₂ transport network. Their location, capacity and start date will influence the mapping and capacities of the transport routes. This, in turn, is expected to draw subsequent projects to use these routes to minimise costs.” 

– Joint Research Centre: European Commission (2025)⁶ 

Leilac’s capture-ready capabilities could be similarly applied to the expansion of North American CCUS infrastructure for cement. In the U.S., many cement plants can be grouped into distinct, geo-spatial clusters. The proximity of multiple plants suggests that the cement industry could play a leading role in CCUS network expansion.  

“If the cement industry leads industrial CCUS deployment, spatial analysis can identify carbon-hubs made of the nearest industrial neighbours to the pipeline to significantly reduce systems costs” 

– MIT Concrete Sustainability hub (2024)⁷ 

A capture-ready cement plant could gain a competitive edge in the emerging carbon market  

Switching to lower carbon fuels can reduce emissions and ensure producers avoid carbon liabilities in the near term. The option to embark on low-cost CCUS has the potential to unlock deep decarbonisation, which may in turn deliver economic access to market incentives such as tax credits and emissions trading schemes.⁸ Carbon abatement can become a source of revenue.  

A capture-ready cement plant could gain first-access to sales of premium low-carbon cement. 

Demand for low-carbon cement is rising⁹. Its trade may be further accelerated by the rapidly developing book and claim type systems that connect the value-chains of ambitious global cement producers and users, without the need for physical offtake.¹⁰ Early adopters could establish leadership in this emerging premium market. 

Future-proofing cement 

CCUS will be essential to the deep decarbonisation of cement. However, the deployment of carbon capture technology needs to both acknowledge and mitigate against commercial uncertainty. Technology solutions that provide multiple benefits can deliver near term value in the absence of an immediately available CO₂ value chain. Moreover, by being adaptable, new technologies can provide producers with the optionality needed to stay resilient in uncertain future outcomes. In this way, Leilac’s unique indirect heating solution aims to enable lowest-cost and flexible pathways to future proof cement production. 

1. Global Cement and Lime Association (2022) – Roadmap to Net Zero. ↩︎
2. Carbon Capture Magazine (2025) – EU Invests Over €1.2 Billion in Cross-Border Infrastructure ↩︎
3. https://carbonpricingdashboard.worldbank.org/ ↩︎
4. https://about.bnef.com/blog/europes-new-emissions-trading-system-expected-to-have-worlds-highest-carbon-price-in-2030-at-e149-bloombergnef-forecast-reveals/ ↩︎
5. The Centre for Economic Policy Research (2024) – Carbon price uncertainty ↩︎
6. European Commission (2024) – CO₂ transport infrastructure: key to achieving climate neutrality by 2050 ↩︎
7. MIT CS Research Brief (2024) – How can the cement industry enable widespread industrial CCUS adoption ↩︎
8. International Carbon Action Partnership(2024) – About Emissions Trading Systems ↩︎
9. IDTechEx (2024) – Demand For Low-Carbon Cement Is On The Rise ↩︎
10. RMI (2024) – Structuring Demand for Lower Carbon Materials ↩︎