Concrete was invented by the Roman people and dates back to around 37 B.C..

The

Romans are incredible for inventing such a substance. By using concrete a large amount of the

structures made from it, are still standing. They were used in such structures like roads and

aqueducts, those things are still there in in good condition even from military invasions, tourist

mobs, and natural disasters.

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Concrete is made differently now compared to how they made it in ancient Roman. It is

written by a famous scholar, the best maritime concrete was made from volcanic ash. It wasn't

just any volcanic ash though. The best ash to use was found in the regions around the Gulf of

Naples, something with its mineral characteristics made it so special. There has also been a

discover on the secret to how the Romans made the concrete so durable. Them Romans first

mixed lime and volcanic rock to form a mortar. Then the concrete was put in wooden forms to

get the correct shape for the structure. Finally it was put in seawater, this triggered a reaction.

The water molecules hydrated the lime and reacted with the ash to cement everything. This is

what made the structure so exceptionally strong.

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Portland concrete is the kind of concrete that people use commonly. This type of concrete

does not have the lime-volcanic combination. Portland concrete tends to wear quickly in

seawater, while on the other hand the Romans worked better in seawater. Portland concrete only

has a service life of less than 50 years, that is nothing compared to the Romans. The Romans

concrete has been lasting thousands of years and counting.

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 The Romans concrete wasn't just better than modern concrete, it was easy to produce. To

produce Portland concrete, carbon is emitted by the burning fuel used to heat a mix of limestone

and clays to 2642 degrees. Romans used much less lime, and made it from limestone baked at

1652 or lower. This used much less fuel and was much more affordable to produce. Ancient

Roman builders may have invented a revolutionary thing for modern architecture.

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Two of the the most significant structures in Rome were built with concrete. Those

structures were the Pantheon and the Colosseum. They have survived for centuries and are still in

great condition, they have had little to no maintenance. In the Pantheon, a temple to the gods,

was completed in A.D. 128. Its dome is still the largest unreinforced concrete dome in the world.

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Due to modern concrete not being as good, almost all domes are reinforced. This is due to

the fact of modern concrete not being strong enough to hold itself up. If modern domes were

built with modern concrete and not reinforced there would be a lot of issues. It would pose a lot

of safety issues after so many years.

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The Colosseum was built in A.D. 80, it seated 50000. It is crazy how a structure purely

made out of concrete could handle 50000 people going in and out frequently. Over all these years

it has had little to no maintenance and looks almost the same as it did when it was built.

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Concrete has truly changed the modern day, without concrete we would not be able to

build many of the things that we now have. Concrete is the second most human-used substance
on earth after water. It has been used from everything from gargantuan public works projects to

skyscrapers to garden figures. It is recorded that approximately 3.7 billing tons of concrete was

produced globally in 2012. There already is around 40 tons of concrete for every person on earth

already existing. Portland Concrete is really taking advantage of this market and going through

the roff with production. The production has nearly quadrupled since 1970. The global output of

cement may possibly reach 5 billion tons by the year 2030 and then possibly 18 billion by the

year 2050.

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This increasing amount of production of concrete poses a large issue. As of right now the

concrete industrys share of global CO2 emissions is about 8%. For Portland Concrete it emits

nearly a ton of CO2 for every ton of cement produced. If you do the math to figure out the

increase its not good. A large increase in production and money may be good for the economy,

but it will not be good for the environment at all.

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I feel that this problem is going to be overlooked for a long time. It is the 3rd highest on CO2

producers and still hasn't became a topic of discussion. I believe that it needs to be dealt with

now, so then in the future we will have the resolution and the issue wouldn't have already went to

far. The Romans were able to make there concrete without having such a CO2 problem. They

weren't even trying not to produce a lot of CO2 either, we should be conscious of the issue and

fix it.

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1) http://www.history.com/news/the-secrets-of-ancient-roman-concrete

2) http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-secrets-of-ancient-romes-buildings-234992/

3) https://riversonghousewright.wordpress.com/about/19-from-rome-to-portland-the-story-of-
concrete/