Nothing to worry about. The backlog is full. | Credit: Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago You’re a Concrete Contractor in 1925. Business Has Never Been Better. It is 1925. You own a concrete construction company in an Amer…

Just another small concrete job. | Wyomingnews.com Data centers are consuming a lot of concrete. That probably isn't news to anyone working in construction right now. But here's the question I think is more interesting: What happens to the concr…

Canadian cement, eh? What’s the tariff all aboot? | cslships.com Who pays a 50% tariff on Canadian cement? Here is a hint. It is not Canada. President Trump announced a 50% tariff on selected Canadian goods, including cement, scheduled to take e…

Cloud Computing, 1946 Style | Credit: U.S. Army photo, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. I got the idea for this blog post from the No Agenda podcast, which I donate to every month. Hint, hint. Now would be a great time to stop reading and do…

I was driving home from work the other day and was almost to the entrance of my neighborhood. The right lane was coned off, and there were four or five Dominion trucks lined up. Crews were setting new power poles. Nothing dramatic. No press con…

Close your eyes and swing? | OpenAI “Hitting is timing. Pitching is upsetting timing.” — Warren Spahn Trying to figure out where the concrete market is headed feels a little like standing in the batter’s box. You do not know what pitch is comi…

Fortera ReCarb Plant | forteraglobal.com “What we see depends mainly on what we look for.” – John Lubbock  The concrete industry has heard enough slogans. Low-carbon cement. Green concrete. Carbon capture. Sustainable binders. Better ch…

Protect those margins...oh, we meant jobs. | OpenAI “Liars are not believed even when they speak the truth.” - Aesop Rebar is one of those things people love to ignore until it becomes a problem. Then it becomes everyone’s problem. It hits t…

No end in sight. | OpenAI The latest earnings reports from Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet were released on April 29, 2026, and they tell a pretty simple story for the concrete industry. The AI data center buildout is not slowing down yet. Wal…

What a load of GOB | Credit Cardinal News "The economy is a derivative of energy." - Doomberg I am part of the 7x24 Central Virginia Exchange Education Committee. It's a committee that is part of 7x24, a networking group for the data cente…

“The real price of every thing, what every thing really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it.” – Adam Smith If you’re in the construction industry, you’re buying cement. Maybe you buy it directly. …

"Wind extinguishes a candle and energizes fire. Likewise with randomness, uncertainty, chaos: you want to use them, not hide from them." - Nassim Nicholas Taleb If you live in the U.S., Australia looks like the place that should have this f…

“We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.”— Roy Amara Last week I saw a post making the rounds about an Anthropic study. The takeaway was familiar. Architecture, engineeri…

"One resists the invasion of armies; one does not resist the invasion of ideas."  – Victor Hugo The Iran war isn’t just another geopolitical headline. It’s an energy reset. And if you’re in concrete, you’re already feeling it whether you …

“Whether one is a conservative or a radical, a protectionist or a free trader, a cosmopolitan or a nationalist, a churchman or a heathen, it is useful to know the causes and consequences of economic phenomena.”— George J. Stigler Sometimes t…

“Good intentions tell you nothing about the actual consequences.” — Thomas Sowell Layoffs are recession behavior. Period. I do not care what economists call it. If demand slows and a company does not need as many people, headcount gets cu…

“Explanations exist; they have existed for all time; there is always a well-known solution to every human problem—neat, plausible, and wrong.”- H. L. Mencken Virginia keeps pouring concrete for data centers like the pace is normal. It isn’t. Ever…

“Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.” — Charles Mackay  A guy wrote that in 1841.  1841.  No internet. No CNBC. No…

Keep your eye on the prize. (Adobe) You’ve probably seen the dumb version of this story already. “Trump wants cheap oil.” “Exxon won’t touch Venezuela.” “Guyana hit the jackpot.” “Russia and China are involved.” All true-ish. Also not useful. He…

When the lights get expensive, everything else follows. For the last few years, Europe has been trying to run an industrial economy on wishful thinking. It looked fine in speeches. It looked even better in press releases. Then the bill showed up.…

Concrete didn’t become the default building material because it was fashionable. It won because it made sense. It was durable. It was local. And for a long time, it was the economical choice when you looked at the whole building—not just one line it…

What’s the productivity benchmark for a guitar-shaped building? (Miami Herald). This week’s post was inspired by a LinkedIn post from Eric Koehler. Hello Eric. Eric is a sharp, thoughtful guy and someone I respect. He was also a guest on the Concr…

Follow the Line. Follow the Money. If you’ve been following the Type IL situation the last few years, you’ve heard every excuse under the sun about why Portland limestone cement suddenly became the “future” of American concrete. We’ve been told it’…

Pipe dream. (Adobe) Every once in a while, the cement industry drops a headline so painfully obvious you wonder if anyone has been awake for the last decade.   This week’s gem?   Europe is sounding the alarm that cement prices could triple by 205…