Word: italcementi
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There's a man here who wants to say one word to you. Just one word. Are you listening? Cement. As head of research and development for Italcementi, Enrico Borgarello knows cement isn't considered the most high-tech--or environmentally friendly--of products. But under his direction, the Bergamo-based Italian company has developed a substance that could turn an ordinary building into a weapon against air pollution...
...called TX Active, and it's an additive for cement that literally eats surrounding smog. "When light shines on TX, the material becomes active and neutralizes surrounding pollutants like nitrous oxide and sulfur dioxide," says Borgarello. According to tests conducted by Italcementi, which spent more than a decade and $10 million developing the product, TX can reduce local air pollutants from 20% to 70%, depending on sunlight levels and wind. (It also adds as much as 20% to the cost of the cement.) Cover 15% of the exposed surfaces of a city like Milan, Borgarello estimates, and you could...
More study will be needed to determine just how effective TX Active is over the long term. So-called catalytic agents can lose their power over time. But Italcementi is already marketing it in the U.S. and Europe.The biggest potential, however, could be in rapidly growing countries like India and China. With annual cement demand expected to exceed 1 billion tons in China alone by 2008, building materials will have an enormous effect on changing urban environments. "We want to show that cement can contribute to the reduction of pollution," says Borgarello. "We can deal with problems that every city...
...Pope's decision that church control of major Italian companies had become a liability. The Vatican owns some $200 million worth of stock in Italian firms. The church until recently either controlled or owned a substantial part of at least a dozen important enterprises, including cement-making Italcementi, paper-manufacturing Cartiere Burgo, pasta-making Molini Biondi and Vianini, a major engineering firm. The investments provide a handsome income to help defray the huge cost of running the papal establishment. But social unrest is growing in Italy. Anxious to align the church with the working class, the Vatican wants...
...their firms to control one another through a cozy network of holding companies. Chemical-making Montecatini Edison, Italy's largest private industrial corporation, was long the leading shareholder in both Italpi and Sade-Finanziaria, holding companies that, as it happens, control Montecatini Edison. Italmobiliare is 100% owned by Italcementi, an important shareholder in Bastogi, which in turn owns more than 10% of Italcementi...
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