Technical evaluation of resistance to compression in concretes made with CPCA cement

In recent years Venezuela has presented a crisis on the demand, commercialization and production of cement, the material needed for construction, therefor additive cements are being used without any type of regulations. This work presents the physical-mechanical characterization of three concrete mixtures with water / cement ratio of 0.45 and water / cement ratio of 0.60 with different types of Portland cement, Type I, Type CPCA1,and the third mixture corresponds to Type CPCA1 Rewarding it with a 15% addition in his own weight, developing a mixture of better quality. These concretes were characterized by: settling, setting time, percentage of total porosity, percentage of water absorption and mechanical resistance to compression. The results showed that the concrete mixture produced with CPCA1 does not meet the minimum requirements established in the Venezuelan standard for use in the elaboration of structural concrete, because among other parameters its resistance to compression it's below the design value. As for the CPCA1 giving it 15% addition in its own weight meets the requirements, and can be used in the manufacture of concrete structural elements

Decarbonising the transport and energy sectors: Technical feasibility and socioeconomic impacts in Costa Rica

Compliance with the Paris Agreement requires the transformation of national economies to meet net-zero carbon dioxide emissions by mid-century. To accomplish this, countries need to define long-term decarbonisation strategies with near- and mid-term actions to determine their ideal future scenario while maximizing socioeconomic benefits. This paper describes the process followed to support the creation of the decarbonisation pathway for the transport and energy sectors presented in Costa Rica's National Decarbonisation Plan. We discuss in detail the technological pathway of a deep-decarbonisation future that supports reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. Compared to a business-as-usual (BAU) scenario, our results show that the decarbonisation pathway can lead to emissions' reduction of 87% in the transport and energy sectors by 2050. Energy efficiency, the adoption of electromobility, modal-shift towards public transport and active mobility, as well as reduced demand due to digitalisation and teleworking, are found to be key drivers towards the deep-decarbonisation. These measures combined enable a 25% reduction of primary energy production by 2050. The results highlight that the decarbonisation scenario requires installing 4.4 GW more of renewable power plants by 2050, compared to the BAU scenario (80%). We also show that additional investments for the deep-decarbonisation are compensated with the reduced operating cost. Crucially, we found that the National Decarbonisation Plan results in a lower total discounted cost of about 35% of current Costa Rica's GDP, indicating that a deep decarbonisation is technically feasible and is coupled to socioeconomic benefits