Bridging the Use, Innovation, Life, and Durability of Concrete (BUILD Concrete)

The Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) associated with this BAA Call, 693JJ3-24-BAA-0003_A0001, can be found at the following link: https://sam.gov/workspace/contract/opp/cae7c3525e1e4120b57a372b0b749233/view. Please refer to the BAA for detailed information and instructions. The concrete industry has undergone more change in the last 10 years than it did in the prior 60 years.

The driver for this was industry-led innovation, as showcased by the cement producer’s shift from traditional Type I/II cement to a Type IL cement as the majority on the market as of 2023. A primary barrier to entry for this new cement was state Departments of Transportation (DOTs), where their specifications and lack of familiarity with the new material resulted in a decade long delay of adoption from the establishment of an initial consensus material specification that was passed in 2012. This shift was a catalyst for innovation and change in the industry, with at least 30 different innovative materials currently known to be attempting to make similar inroads in the marketplace.

These materials boast a variety of different claims including lower costs, improved performance, better supply, and lower variability. With ongoing challenges from diminishing sources of conventional supplementary materials like fly ash and seasonal shortages of silica fume and ground-granulated blast furnace slag, these innovative alternative cements and supplementary materials collectively represent a significant improvement to the supply chain for concrete production and construction.

The FHWA seeks to accelerate the implementation of next generation binder technologies into engineering practice while assuring these materials maintain proper durability and improve infrastructure integrity. This is anticipated to be accomplished in part through benchmarking performance of solutions which have achieved a suitable technology readiness level such that they may be implemented in an industrial trial.

The FHWA is seeking solutions of market-ready binders to be benchmarked against (at a minimum) an industrially produced Class A concrete with a target 28-day compressive strength of 4000 psi (see Table 8.2.2-1, AASHTO LRFD Bridge Construction Specifications), with mixture proportions preferably in general agreement with the offeror’s regional norms.