Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: This is Constructive Voices. Constructive Voices, the podcast for the construction people with news, views and expert interviews.
Hi, this is Jackie Deburpa here for Constructive Voices. I am again with the lovely Anna Haas from Neustark who did a fantastic interview in the last episode of Constructive Voices telling us about Zurich and what's been happening there and really making me considering that I might relocate there. She did such a great job.
Now Anna, for those who didn't tune into that episode and probably will do hopefully afterwards, could you introduce yourself first of all?
[00:00:43] Speaker B: Yes, sure. Thank you Jackie for having me. I'm Anna Haas, originally German, live in Switzerland for the past 10 years. Mining engineer by trade.
That education has changed a lot from really just mining of primary resources to primary and secondary resources. Circular economy.
Yeah. Sustainability, processing of the materials.
I have then worked a couple of years in the machine building industry before changing scenes and industry not only like from corporate to startup, but also from machine building to construction or like a construction focus.
Also that being sat with a family background in construction and dinner table conversations my entire life as my dad is a geological engineer and my mom has been working for one of the largest construction corporates in Europe.
Yes.
[00:01:42] Speaker A: Okay, how interesting is always interesting the background of guests who.
Yeah, where did it come from? Is it related to family? Is it related to place? All of that type of stuff. And what really drew you though with that background that you have and what actually drew you to the world of sustainability and carbon removal and how did that path lead you to Neustark?
[00:02:02] Speaker B: Yeah, interesting from my interests and like what I was good at in school. I was always like a jack of all trades. I was interested in so many things, I never knew what to study.
And then I looked a little deeper into topics where I would see future proof, potential in a sense. And I thought population is ever growing, we will always need resources. Mining is one of the, at least by reputation, dirtiest industries that you can think of. And there's so much need for doing like making it better. And especially if you live in central Europe and also see your future in central Europe as I do, it's not so much copper and gold that you're dealing with, but really construction materials. And yeah, I never thought that also like these dinner table conversations as I mentioned, have so much influence on what you already know and how you think about things. But yeah, coming into the industry I figured, oh, there's so many things I've already heard about just because I just heard my parents chat about it all the time.
Yeah, that's pretty Much how I ended up here.
[00:03:09] Speaker A: Okay, and what led you to Neustark itself?
[00:03:13] Speaker B: Neustark itself. I worked for Contact before, so construction tech startup and that was more on the digital side of things.
And I was with that organization. I also in a role as like an innovation and sustainability lead and was doing tech scoutings every once in a while and I met a representative of Neustark at a large conference and we got talking and I found it super interesting especially for the fact that like bringing a real life hardware technical solution to that market that I'm very passionate about. And while I honor everyone working in tech and I really also AI technical solutions, there is so much potential in that. But I see it very much as a tool. Like my passion often lies in the things to touch and grab and change. Because even if one day we just sit in a room with a AI headset in our face, we will sit in that room and that room has had to be built at some point. And so the tangible world will not go away.
[00:04:24] Speaker A: That's fantastic because it leads so nicely, Anna, into my next question, which actually is Neustark's model is refreshingly tangible in the carbon removal space.
How would you explain what neustark does to someone who's outside the climate or construction world? What's the one thing people often misunderstand about carbon capture in concrete?
[00:04:48] Speaker B: Okay, so. Well, really the short pitch for neustag is we store carbon dioxide in concrete, demolition waste and also other waste streams.
So that is the basic. And how do we do that? And there's several aspects to that. We are an add on process to an existing recycler's processing activities. So you crush your screen and then you can also carbonate that material.
I'd say a common misunderstanding that we're facing is that you can carbonate everything and you really cannot carbonate everything. It's a chemical process. So material needs to hold certain properties that actually mineralizes the CO2 into limestone.
[00:05:39] Speaker A: Okay, now as a sales manager, Anna, you're right at the intersection of innovation and impact.
What does selling a carbon removal solution actually look like in practice?
[00:05:53] Speaker B: Okay, let me take you through our sales cycle. No, I'm going to. It really starts a lot with step one is really getting people and organizations to learn about us, to know about us. Many have not even heard that like a recycler, that it is an option to store or sequester CO2 in the material. So in the beginning of the, of the sales process there is very much that education part.
People are very curious. It also from our end, it takes a little bit to understand is this really an interesting prospect for our solution or is this someone who's just generally very interested in sustainable solutions overall in the industry, but not an eligible customer? Yeah, so there's always a couple of things we try to understand and that really centers around what kind of material are the partners processing.
And as I said before, if you have mixed rubble, that also holds some uptake potential for CO2. But the more actual concrete demolition waste is in the mix, the better the uptake is and the better also the financials in a sense. Because how does the business model work as a recycler? You put that add on process in your yard and then you actually get a storage fee for every ton of CO2 stored. And we can pay that storage fee because we also work with large organizations around the globe, like big tech, big banks, insurances, who buy these CDR certificates in the voluntary market for emissions that they cannot further reduce.
And the voluntary market is very distinctly different from the compliance market that there's also in place. That is also probably a thing to mention.
[00:07:46] Speaker A: It was really fascinating to learn about this. And do you see a shift, Anna, in how clients are perceiving the value of carbon removal?
[00:07:57] Speaker B: And that has a lot to do with external factors, I would say. So as soon as the end consumer or like the planner is asking for more sustainable options, it also gives the recycler the opportunity to sell their material at a premium. But if no one cares, no one pays.
So the market change really does a lot. And also this goes as far as in Switzerland, for instance, like the city of Zurich, we even see in public tenders that carbonated recycling material is actually in the tender. And that makes all the difference because suddenly the recycler has a USP to carbonate the material and then that's an advantage that goes beyond just the extra pound you'd make on carbonating the material on the cdr. Basically.
[00:08:54] Speaker A: I'm just going to pause for one second.
[00:08:57] Speaker B: I don't know where it's coming from.
[00:09:02] Speaker A: So obviously Anna, we're at a time in history where the carbon removal space is full of like bold promises.
How does Neustark balance the urgency to scale with the need to stay scientifically rigorous and grounded in measurable impact?
[00:09:20] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a great question.
Our measuring system is sound, whereas third party observed, so to say, like the CDR is only paid if everything works well. I would say with gold standard there's also a high trust in that institution.
The bigger challenge really is also the expectation of miracles. The market somehow holds as we see also venture capital and at the same time the ambitions we have ourselves. Right. So we actually want to remove a million tons of CO2 and initially that goal was by 2030 and that goal remains 2030. But we start realizing that just through mineralization in concrete, demolition waste and scaling the solution through the market, that is probably not realistic. So we are also looking for alternative CDR solutions that we can pursue. So it's a constant R and D exploration as well of one what can be done. And it's also always very interesting to see what other people do, how they are living up to the potential promises. But as it is such a new market, I wouldn't say people started overpromising because they wanted to over promise. It's because didn't know any better. And we're just starting to know better and adjusting these statements and understanding where bigger levers also are. And that is ongoing and will be ongoing for a while, I suppose.
[00:10:54] Speaker A: Okay.
Now obviously Neustark works with demolition waste and biogenic CO2 from biogas plants to waste streams that are turned into a climate solution.
Can you walk us through Anna, how that closed loop system works? What kind of partnerships are key to making it viable?
[00:11:15] Speaker B: So starting with what's key to make it viable. It's not only the partnerships with who we do it, but it's also very much geographically.
Because why is that we capture CO2 somewhere at point source at a biogas biomethane plant and then that CO2 is liquefied and actually transported to the recycling partners.
And we have to obviously talking about sound methods before we have to look at the gray emissions that are generated in that process as well. And the further you drive, the higher the gray emission, the less sense the system makes because you're like you're eating up your benefit if you have to drive too fast. So we're always trying to build geographical clusters where we match a biogenic source with several recyclers that are around.
Sorry, I'm saying kilometers here, 100 kilometers approximately radius. That's okay, yeah, that's no problem from that point source. And then so we Transport the liquefied CO2.
It's just way more efficient because it's 500 times more compromised than if you would like transport the gas to the recycling site and There is a CO2 storage tank evaporator where the CO2 is again changed from the liquid to the gaseous state and then the gases CO2 is brought to the material in some sort of reaction chamber. It's like a gas tied room. It can be a silo, it can be a box. We have done different projects with different partners. The state of the art so to say would be a box. So solution. So there's a box, there's a concrete demolition waste in it that the recycler has processed, has sieved, has crushed, put into configuration for selling it off to the market. Before selling it off. It is in that box system.
The gas is CO2, the system is closed, the gas is CO2, enters the system and then yeah, I like to say the magic happens just very plainly. The calcium hydroxide reacts with the CO2 to limestone. Really it literally fossilizes.
And what is a challenge that we have in that process, it is relatively seamless because it's just like an add on process step. But everything else the processor or the recycler does beforehand is a continuous process.
And the chemical reaction take some time. You would have to let it sit for. Yeah, let's say you're letting it sit overnight and that works quite well. But the thing to consider is that if the operators on the recycling side are not up for it, it's not going to work. Because think of a recycling side. A big recycler is doing like a hundred thousand tons of material a year.
Massive. You can't even like thinking about the quantities in the day to day. People have no idea how much material that is. So it has to be run well. And yes, that is why we absolutely need the buy in also from the operators on site. That is what successful partnerships look like if everyone is on board and also understands what's happening. Sure.
[00:14:42] Speaker A: Okay, great answer. Now there's a lot of talk about permanence in carbon removal. How does Neustark address this issue? And what role does mineralization in concrete play in making carbon storage truly long term.
[00:14:56] Speaker B: Yeah, the entire permanence debate is a very relevant one.
You can rate the quality of a carbon credit often by its permanence. And I would say mineralization is a forerunner in that. Or like a method to choose just being because it's fossilization, the mineralization itself a chemical process.
[00:15:21] Speaker A: That's okay, I was hearing you fine.
[00:15:23] Speaker B: Okay, super.
[00:15:24] Speaker A: That's grand. No problem.
[00:15:25] Speaker B: And yes, the mineralization. So the fossilization literally is a chemical process that changes the properties of the material and also that can be reversed. But it's very defined what the reversal can be. And it's also very unlikely that the reversal happens. One is you would bath the material acid. So changing the ph that would actually influence the chemistry as much. And the second one is heat the material over 600 degrees Celsius as it is the reverse reaction of what happens in the cement kill that would where you know, to produce cement burn limestone so that you have the reactive material. And what we do is we have the reactive material, we put CO2 with it and then it's the non reactive limestone again. So you can reverse that by heating it up again. So one of the requirements that we sign in the collaboration agreements with our partners is actually you can do this, but only if you make sure that this material never sees the kiln again. You cannot dispose that in the kiln. It would make the entire process. Nonsense. Yeah, that's a contractual requirement actually. But other things with other things, like the very simple example planting a tree and please keep planting trees, it's super important. But planting a tree and then something threatens that tree, someone like.
[00:16:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:16:46] Speaker B: Kills it or there's not the nutritious environment and the tree dies for whatever reason.
All the CO2 that has been captured by that tree is going back into the environment because you happen had an opportunity to really fix or permeate that. Right.
Sure. You have the biochar approach which goes into keeping the CO2 also in the organics and not have them rot away.
[00:17:14] Speaker A: Okay.
Switzerland. Anna obviously considered a bit of a hub for climate tech, but Neustark as a company is going global. And I know this is going to be a really big question, but how do regional differences in construction practices or regulations affect your global expansion strategy?
[00:17:35] Speaker B: Huge. And it's funny that you asked that question just last month. I've been to the concrete and demolition world in Dallas, Texas to get a better idea of the concrete and demolition market in the United States.
And it was very fascinating to see for someone coming from Europe. And I would say I know the European markets quite well yet to also see the difference and also see where they stand development wise. But let's start with Europe. And to tell you one major difference already is also depending on the primary resources situation in a country, different amounts of material are actually landfilled.
So in regions with a strong primary industry, there's a strong primary resource lobby. And recycling is usually not as favored also not historically, not politically favored, because it's not in the business's best interest to have a competitive material enter.
Even in different markets, even across the UK or in Germany, we see differences in the different regions just based on the geological situation and interest behind that. In the us, the Americans and also Asians build very differently than wheat. So it's not as natural brick mortar and concrete, but it's more wood and insulation. Overall, the demolition is really not as suitable for our process.
You really have to see where are the major infrastructure investments because all these overpasses, all these bridges, that's all made out of concrete. But it's very different in where to look and what to target as like a first idea. Does that answer your question?
[00:19:20] Speaker A: Yeah, no, it does. And I know it's a huge question, so I wasn't expecting like a narrow answer. Obviously. What are the next big priorities for your next phase of growth and what excites you most, Anna, about what's coming next?
[00:19:33] Speaker B: What excites me most?
I think overall, despite also political movements ongoing, I feel like a couple of years ago you still had to explain to everybody what CDR was. What, like sustainability measures are more than window dressing and all these kind of things. And I feel like there has been a more common understanding and also interest in pushing.
Yeah. The agenda forward. And that really excites me because it.
Yeah, you can skip so many steps up front that are really just about change management and you can really just get to it, start the work and so that's part two of your question. Can you repeat the first part, please?
[00:20:20] Speaker A: Okay, don't worry about that, Jeff. So just touching on the funding, obviously that's been received and what are the big priorities for the next phase of growth?
[00:20:30] Speaker B: Yes, absolutely. So we've really covered the Swiss market and are expanding across Europe. We also in the UK have like our first plant up and running now.
But really the activities in the UK are just getting started and it's cool to come into a new market, new playing field, new conversations, new partners to get to know. Also a little bit of a new scene. Also the CO2 side of things is definitely different in different markets and countries. I'm as a very curious, inquisitive person, I love entering new markets and just understanding them and understanding how to make them work and build the business there. And I think that's like what we're up to in the UK at the moment. After generating that first attention, now we're having conversations and trying to bring more projects to life. And yeah, that is a big focus. Also a big focus for us at the moment. The Benelux region, the Netherlands, we see similarities to Switzerland in terms of innovation, also sustainability push.
The Netherlands do not have any hard rock material in their market. So they have almost a hundred percent recycling rate for anything there is. And also Regulation that really favors that. And that makes it also fun to work with because you already got a can do mindset.
And in regions where you have a lot of primary material, people more conservative are often just trying to hold back new developments because it just really changes the market landscape and that also scares people.
Sure.
So in regions with higher pains and need for solutions, there is just better momentum.
[00:22:13] Speaker A: Yes. I can imagine going back to that famous list that we talked about in the first episode where you and I chatted regarding Zurich. At the moment, Amsterdam is in the place of number one on sustainable cities and Rotterdam on the place of number three. So, yeah, obviously very much in tune with what you've just said about the Netherlands. Of course, now I'm not talking so much about an area that's forward looking, such as there or Switzerland. But in general with the work you're doing, you've spoken to a lot of like skeptical decision makers along the line. What's one of the most powerful moments of mindset shift you've seen when it comes to carbon removal within construction? The built environment in general?
[00:23:03] Speaker B: Yeah. I feel like the moment that people realize that there's actual demand in the market always does something and that is sometimes even accompanied with disbelief. But I enjoy these moments because it always triggers different thinking. Like the moment you say, yeah, but there's actually people paying a premium for that.
That's the point where the recyclers get creative and start thinking, okay, how can I make this happen on my side and actually create a USP over this? Because even though there is an interest to serve ecological measures and to.
Yeah, to do, in the end, it's a business. Margins in the construction material space are like not big. They're really fighting. So the moment they understand they can actually build their business on part of that, on that value proposition. That's the one I like.
[00:24:02] Speaker A: Good, excellent. Now, on a personal note, Anna, working in climate can be both energizing and heavy. What keeps you motivated in the space? What kind of future are you personally working towards?
[00:24:20] Speaker B: One thing that really struck me a month ago in the US is when I learned that a lot of the entire industry is natural disaster driven.
Meaning there's organizations, they really just work with the government in order to clean up after hurricanes, wildfires, tornadoes and whatever other natural disasters there are.
And even though we have terrible things happen in Europe, it's not as prevalent yet.
And to me, preserving that environment, like I talked earlier about, for me the absolute worst idea of the future is just sitting in a room with a Headset and not being able to live in the natural space anymore. And I guess especially also living in a country like Switzerland really makes you marvel at the beauty and also enjoy nature and really cherish it.
I absolutely want to preserve that and want to do my part and do my best and not just leave the world as I found it, but try to be one little bit better than before. And that may sound pathetic and super big, but I think that really is a driver for me, certainly.
[00:25:40] Speaker A: No, I've had other guests that I've spoken down and the concept has been if everybody, and these are very well known experts and all sorts of different. Coming from different backgrounds, the conclusion is if everybody just did what tiny bit they feel that they can do, that would be a huge solution within itself, wouldn't it?
[00:25:58] Speaker B: Yes. We often feel so powerless, but it's naive. Democracy wouldn't work if we wouldn't trust in our vote. Right. So why don't we trust in our daily actions and the little things that we can do and really believe that they make a difference? Because that really also keeps me going and working in the space and also exchanging, networking with other people, seeing the daily challenges that we're facing. Also partially it makes you struggle, obviously, but at the same time, there's just something so powerful in knowing if you keep going, you'll eventually find a solution.
So far, we've always managed somehow.
[00:26:47] Speaker A: Sure, absolutely.
So I guess you said everything that I would need to know. Learning about the company Neustark that you're working with, is there anything that you feel that you've left out?
[00:27:02] Speaker B: Let me think. So I think maybe a little more UK specific, maybe. One thing I'd like to add is we see a lot of positive developments in UK funding towards ccs, but I feel like that there's still a lot of potential to supplement towards permanent carbon sequestration where there's not a highlight on, because maybe there's also not knowledge about that. And also many opportunities in public tenders. There are, and I feel like the entire political environment in the UK would currently allow for that.
So, yeah, that would be exciting if we could tap into potential there.
[00:27:49] Speaker A: But, yeah, yeah, we have a lot of UK listeners, so certainly that's really good that you've said, Ashton, and hopefully those messages will fall on the right ears. Anna, it's been really wonderful to speak to you again. Thank you so much for your time.
[00:28:04] Speaker B: Thank you, Jackie.
[00:28:06] Speaker A: Thank you. This is constructive voices.
