NRMCA Vice President, Local Paving, Phil Kresge recently conducted a Selling Concrete Parking Lots workshop for the Northern Virginia Concrete Advisory Council of the Virginia Ready-Mixed Concrete Association (VRMCA). Attendees included ready mix producers, cement and admixtures representatives. The workshop was organized by VRMCA Director of Industry Services Hessam Nabavi. The three-hour program focused on Identifying Opportunities, Targeting Key Target Markets and Understanding ACI 330. NRMCA’s Concrete Pavement Analyst (CPA) and Design Assistance Program (DAP) were also highlighted. Additionally, some of the veteran VRMCA members shared their success stories with the newer members. Following the program, Kresge spoke with several of the attendees who indicated they were excited to move forward with what they had learned.

The Selling Concrete Parking Lots Workshop is one in the series of programs offered by NRMCA to assist members in growing their share of the parking lot pavement market. Other programs include Promotion Training for the Concrete Professional and the popular Concrete Parking Lots Boot Camp.

Late last week, NRMCA Senior Director, Local Paving, Ken Justice joined Jason Kruger and Cherish Schwenn of the Wisconsin Ready Mixed Concrete Association for their 17th annual Technical Workshop and awards ceremony. Topics discussed included the latest information from Wisconsin DOT and Natural Resources, Gradation and Mix Design Optimization, and a very interesting session on deicers and their effect on concrete joints. Justice also discussed NRMCA's Design Assistance Program as well as other services and publications available to the 175+ attendees. In addition, the annual WRMCA awards were given to the projects of the year in Wisconsin.

For more information, contact Ken Justice at kjustice@nrmca.org.

2016 was an exciting year for NRMCA. Check out all of the great work NRMCA is doing for our members every day in the 2016 President’s Report. The report highlights many of the achievements NRMCA and its members accomplished in 2016 and looks ahead to the great work we’ll do in 2017. Also, don’t forget to check out the Build with Strength Year in Review to learn about all of the promotion activity in the building sector.

The early bird registration deadline for NRMCA’s 2017 Annual Convention, scheduled for March 4-6 at the Encore at Wynn Las Vegas Hotel is just around the corner. Register now to save over $100 on your registration fees. NRMCA’s Annual Convention is the venue to explore industry trends and network with your peers.

NRMCA has contracted a block of rooms at the Encore at a discounted rate of $299/night plus applicable taxes (currently 12%) with an optional daily resort fee of $29/night plus applicable taxes. This fee will cover several in room amenities. Hotel reservations can be made by calling the Encore Las Vegas directly at 702-770-7171 and asking for the block code "6NRM 0317" or the "National Ready Mixed Concrete Association" rate; you may also your hotel reservations online. The hotel reservations cut-off date is Thursday, February 9, or whenever the room block sells out, whichever occurs first. The room block is reserved for attendees of the NRMCA 2017 Annual Convention only.

The Manufacturers, Products & Services (MPS) Division of NRMCA is now accepting nominations for the 2017 Concrete Cares Award, which recognizes outstanding contributions in community service by an NRMCA Producer member company. With ready mixed concrete plants in almost every community in America, NRMCA member companies are making a real difference. From Earth Day celebrations, to organized volunteering for Boys & Girls Clubs, local schools and recreation departments, to raising awareness for breast cancer screenings, ready mixed producers are at work every day in their communities. The Concrete Cares Award aims to recognize these efforts and shine a national spotlight on the positive impact ready mixed concrete companies have in hometowns across the nation. A donation in the name of the selected honoree will be made to the charity of their choice. The award will be presented at NRMCA’s Annual Convention, March 4-6, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada, during the Association’s annual awards breakfast.

NRMCA encourages you to join your industry allies for the Transportation Construction Coalition’s (TCC) 2017 Legislative Fly-in on Capitol Hill on May 17-18 in Washington, DC. The registration fee of $175 includes conference materials, legislative briefings, continental breakfast, and a Capitol Hill reception. Cancellations after May 12 will be non refundable. This year’s meeting will be held at the Hyatt Regency Washington, at 400 New Jersey Avenue, NW, Washington, DC, 20001. To make your hotel reservation, please contact the hotel by calling 1-800-421-1442 or 202-737-1234. Ask for the group code: TCC Fly-In rate of $329 per night. The cut-off date for the hotel room block is April 17, 2017.

 

This year’s event will likely center around the incoming administration's plan for a $1 trillion funding package to modernize our nation’s transportation and infrastructure system. During last week’s Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee confirmation hearing for Transportation Secretary-designee Elaine Chao, Ms. Chao pledged to collaborate with Congress to seek every funding option possible to shore up the Highway Trust Fund’s looming deficit. NRMCA is committed to working with the incoming administration and Secretary-designee Chao – once confirmed – to help find a solution to this problem.

 

We will also host our next NRMCA Quarterly DC Days on Wednesday, May 18, in conjunction with the TCC Fly-In. NRMCA’s Quarterly DC Days is an opportunity for you to come to your nation’s capital to meet with your congressional representatives and their staffs to talk about important issues impacting the ready mixed concrete industry. This event will focus specifically on the $1 trillion transportation and infrastructure package and its potential impact to the ready mixed concrete industry. More details regarding both events will soon follow.  

A battalion chief and tour commander in the Hoboken, NJ, Fire Department named Brian Crimmins recently wrote about efforts in his state to increase the fire safety of buildings. Currently, there are several pieces of legislation in the New Jersey State House that would go a long way toward bringing codes on par with fire safety standards for buildings like that which burned in Edgewater, NJ. These include common-sense code changes such as limits on light-framed, combustible structures in highly populated areas, a requirement for a 24-hour fire watch during the construction process, and signage that helps firefighters understand more about the nature of the building before entering.

 

Assembly Bill 1914, introduced by Assemblyman John Wisniewski, D-Middlesex, is the first step in the right direction. Written in response to the Avalon fire, it would bring about needed measures to ensure fire safety during all phases of construction. It protects the construction workers during the building phase, the eventual residents and the fire safety professionals who would be called upon in the event of a natural or man-made disaster. Most importantly, it comes from the logical construct that most of us have come to realize: wood burns and we need to find ways to control the fire or prevent it from ever happening by building with safer, fire-resistant materials, such as concrete or steel.

 

Build with Strength is a first-of-its-kind program for the concrete industry, designed not only to support NRMCA members, their businesses and the hard-working men and women of the concrete industry, but also to change the way people think about concrete construction versus direct competitors like soft-wood lumber. NRMCA has resources to help members and state affiliates advocate for resilient and safer construction, including model legislation, talking points, public relations and other key strategies.

 

Oklahoma is a national leader in safe rooms and has supported the construction of more than 11,000 residential safe rooms and 85 school safe rooms using federal grants, reports NRMCA Vice President, Sustainability, Codes and Standards, Tien Peng. Oklahoma has a creative initiative called the SoonerSafe Safe Room Rebate Program, which today serves as a model for supporting the construction of safe rooms through state and federal funding.  

Following the May 3, 1999 tornado, Oklahoma initiated the first safe room rebate program in the nation. The state and FEMA plan continued this innovative partnership following a 2003 tornado and the recent tornado outbreak in central Oklahoma. The program is unique as it provides annual grants as opposed to only after a disaster. Because of the rebate program, the Oklahoma State Constitution allowed for tax exemptions for the construction of safe rooms up to 100 square feet that were installed after January 1, 2002. In addition to the state rebate program, Oklahoma and FEMA have worked with counties and municipalities in their efforts to provide additional localized funding match for safe rooms.

With support of industry members, the Canadian Ready Mix Concrete Association has published its industry average environmental impacts for concrete. Responding to product transparency drivers, including green building standards, the Industry-Wide (IW) Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) discloses the environmental impacts of concrete manufacturing for a wide range of concrete products. The EPD lists impacts for a range of eight compressive strengths utilizing various percentages of SCMs, limestone substitute for clinker and benchmark mixes. In total, the EPD lists 125 mixes, covering most concrete used in residential, commercial and public construction.

The EPD was developed in collaboration with industry members. The Athena Sustainable Materials Institute conducted the life-cycle assessment and developed the EPD which was third-party verified by NSF International. The CRMCA IW-EPD can be found here.

This effort is another example where the ready mixed concrete industry can claim a leadership position in transparency when comparing to other product categories. For a listing of NRMCA IW-EPD, Benchmark reports and services that facilitate company specific EPDs, please visit here. As part of the Build with Strength campaign, NRMCA promotes industry competitiveness in the green building marketplace and the trends toward product and company transparency.

Last week, the House of Representatives made good on its promise to put the reins on out-of-control federal agencies by passing several bills aimed at gutting regulations that stifle the economic growth of American businesses. Some of the bills passed were the Regulatory Accountability Act, which would require agencies to use less costly regulations to achieve its goals; the Midnight Rule Relief Act, which would give Congress the ability to vacate all the previous administration's midnight rules (regulations issued in the final 60 days of the outgoing administration) and the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny (REINS) Act, which requires Congress to approve any agency regulation costing $100 million or more. Each of these bills seeks to restore the power of oversight to Congress.

NRMCA supports these bills, but of particular interest is the Regulatory Accountability Act of 2017, H.R. 5,  which passed by a bipartisan vote of 238-183. The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Goodlatte (R-VA), seeks to prevent executive agencies and departments from promulgating regulations that are beyond the intent of Congress and that unduly harm businesses. Among the reforms included in H.R. 5 is a requirement that federal agencies, when formulating a new rule, choose the lowest-cost rulemaking alternative that meets the statutory requirement. In addition, the bill requires agencies to account for the direct, indirect and cumulative impacts of new regulations on small businesses and to publish a plain-language summary of proposed, forthcoming regulations.

 

The early push for regulatory reform was the biggest political component of the last election. Regulations published in 2016 alone imposed costs of $164 billion on the economy and added 120 million hours of paperwork. The ready mixed concrete industry has been negatively impacted by an onslaught of regulations over the last eight years. Two of these regulations – emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks and the workplace silica rule – impose a combined $38 billion burden on the ready mixed concrete industry. For this reason, NRMCA is joining the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in sending senators a letter in strong support of the regulatory reforms in H.R. 5.  

The bills passed in the House last week have been received in the Senate and referred to the appropriate committees for action. NRMCA will keep you informed as these bills make their way through the Senate.

The 96th annual meeting of the Transportation Research Board (TRB) was held earlier this month in Washington, DC. More than 14,000 transportation professionals, academics and industry personnel attended, an increase of about 5% over the previous year. There were some more than 5,000 papers presented along with more than 800 lectern and poster sessions. Highlights included:

 

• NRMCA’s Karthik Obla presented a poster titled, "Should Minimum Cementitious Contents for Concrete be Specified?" This subject was well received with many highway DOT officials stating that their specs will not have minimum cementitious contents in the future. This paper will be published in the 2017 Transportation Research Record.

• There was a workshop on durability of accelerated concrete construction – discussion included lowering strength requirements for early opening of pavements and developing a synthesis of concrete performance using inorganic binders among other things.

• A paper was presented on the beneficial use of fly ash to prevent failure due to calcium oxy chloride formation in concrete subject to calcium chloride deicers. A paper on the beneficial use of alumina on ASR prevention in concrete was presented.

• The nanotechnology-based concrete materials task force has become a subcommittee of TRB’s Basic Research and Emerging Technologies Related to Concrete Committee. A paper was presented showing that the use of 0.05% carbon nanotubes increased concrete stiffness by 50% by increasing CSH stiffness. Compressive strength was not increased.

• There was a summary paper on the use of internal curing in concrete.

• There was a short presentation on early joint deterioration in concrete pavements. More information can be found here.

• The 2018 TRB is likely to feature a workshop on Performance Engineering Mixtures. A 5-year, $3 million pooled fund study led by CP Tech Center in Iowa has been initiated on this topic. This study will primarily work on training and implementation of case studies of projects designed with performance engineered mixtures. A new AASHTO provisional standard on Performance Engineered Mixtures has been developed and will be published in April 2017.

 

The theme of the 2018 TRB meeting which will be held January 7-11 is Transportation: Moving the Economy to the Future. There will be a TRB spotlight session on Rebuilding and Retrofitting the Transportation Infrastructure to be held September 26-27, 2017 in Washington, DC.

 

The Transportation Research Board (TRB) has scheduled a Webinar on Monday, January 23, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. Eastern time on roller-compacted concrete (RCC) pavements, which has not been widely used by U.S. highway agencies, but may provide benefits like cost-effectiveness and ease of construction. This Webinar will focus on information in Technical Brief FHWA-HIF-16-003. The presenters will discuss RCC materials, mixtures, designs and uses. This Webinar is organized by the TRB Standing Committees on Design and Rehabilitation of Concrete Pavements, Concrete Pavement Construction and Rehabilitation, and Pavement Rehabilitation. A certificate for 1.5 Professional Development Hours (PDHs) will be provided to attendees who register and attend the Webinar as individuals.

 

January 19, Ontario, CA

Improving Concrete Quality

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

January 24 - 26, Silver Spring, MD

CCSP Module III: General Business Knowledge

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

January 24 - 27, Kansas City, MO *Sold Out

Plant Manager Certification Course

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

February 7, Dallas *Sold Out

Leadership, Coaching & Management Skills for Senior RMC Managers

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

February 6 - 10, Salt Lake City

Regional "Short Course"

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

February 21 - 24, Atlanta *Sold Out

Plant Manager Certification Course

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

February 28, Harrisburg, PA

Improving Concrete Quality

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

March 4 - 6, Las Vegas, NV

Annual Convention

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

March 20 - 22, Atlanta

NRMCA Safety Course

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

March 21 - 23, Silver Spring, MD

CCSP Module IV: Professional Sales Skills

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152

 

April 25 - 28, Seattle

Plant Manager Certification Course

Email: Jessica Walgenbach, 888-84-NRMCA, x1152