Cutting Carbon in Concrete with Mathieu Bauchy from Concrete.ai

Did you know that concrete is the second most-used material in the world after water? Although it has largely defined modern society, concrete has a hidden climate cost: it is responsible for 1.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide entering the atmosphere annually. For context, that’s more than the entire aviation industry! With these statistics in mind, today’s guest is on a mission to decarbonize the construction industry. As the CTO and co-founder of cleantech startup, Concrete.ai, Mathieu Bauchy is using his expertise in artificial intelligence and materials modeling to prescribe new concrete formulations that are less carbon-intensive and more economical. Today, Mathieu joins me to offer insight into Concrete.ai's exciting technology, why it’s important for the planet, and how it can reduce concrete emissions by a third while also ensuring that concrete producers maximize margins and streamline their supply chains. To find out how this is possible without any changes to the raw materials, no modification of the production process, and no cost premium, be sure to tune in today!

Key Points:

• Insight into Mathieu’s research focus and how it led him to create Concrete.ai.
• What Concrete.ai does and why it’s important for reducing CO2 emissions.
• The role of machine learning, particularly generative AI, in this technology.
• How Concrete.ai develops ML models that are reliably able to extrapolate.
• Why estimating uncertainty is important and how Concrete.ai approaches it.
• What goes into validating these models, including systematic testing in the field.
• Reasons that the timing for Concrete.ai’s technology is critical.
• Dollars saved and other metrics for measuring the impact of this technology.
• Mathieu’s humanity-focused advice for other leaders of AI-powered startups.
• How Concrete.ai’s impact will continue to expand and evolve.

Quotes:

“Concrete is responsible for 8% of the total CO2 emissions in the world. To give you some context, that's about three times more emissions than the entire aviation industry.” — Mathieu Bauchy

“We think that it's the right time for the concrete industry to benefit from what AI can offer to avoid waste during the production of concrete. The idea is that, if we adopt these new technologies, then we can continue to improve our quality of life.” — Mathieu Bauchy

“It's not like we are changing the way concrete is made. It's still made in the same plant. It's still made using the same materials. We are just changing the recipe, and just that [can] save about a third of the emissions of concrete.” — Mathieu Bauchy

“AI also comes with its own carbon footprint and, to some extent, also contributes to climate change. We should think about how we use AI to solve climate change and not further contribute to it.” — Mathieu Bauchy

Links:

Concrete.ai
Concrete.ai on LinkedIn

Mathieu Bauchy

Mathieu Bauchy on LinkedIn

Mathieu Bauchy on YouTube

Mathieu Bauchy on X

Resources for Computer Vision Teams:

LinkedIn – Connect with Heather.

Computer Vision Insights Newsletter – A biweekly newsletter to help bring the latest machine learning and computer vision research to applications in people and planetary health.

Computer Vision Strategy Session – Not sure how to advance your computer vision project? Get unstuck with a clear set of next steps. Schedule a 1 hour strategy session now to advance your project.

Foundation Model Assessment – Foundation models are popping up everywhere – do you need one for your proprietary image dataset? Get a clear perspective on whether you can benefit from a domain-specific foundation model.