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Association & Industry News
The estimated ready mixed concrete produced in December 2017 is 23 million cubic yards, 3.5% higher than that in December 2016. The estimated production in the U.S. for 2017 is 351 million cubic yards, 2.4% higher than that in 2016. Ready mixed concrete production is estimated from cement shipments reported by the U.S. Geological Survey. NRMCA members can view additional details including production by state in 2017 here. The next in a series of Webinars from the MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub (CSHub) is titled Streamlined Building Life Cycle Assessment and will take place on Thursday, March 15, beginning at 11 a.m. Eastern time. Click here for more information and registration link.
Buildings
Lumber is in short supply as builders head into a spring building season that is expected to be one of the busiest in years. Prices started to rise as wildfires destroyed prime forests and Hurricane Irma temporarily shut down Florida and Georgia mills. A trade dispute between the U.S. and Canada, which supplies one-third of U.S. lumber, exacerbated the issue. And on top of that, a shortage of railcars and trucks has driven up transportation costs. Material prices now rival labor shortages as builders’ main concerns, a National Association of Home Builders survey showed in January. Prices for common building varieties like spruce and southern pine are at or near records, according to price-tracking publication Random Lengths. March-dated lumber futures at the ChicagoMercantile Exchange hit a record of $532.60 per 1,000 board feet last week after climbing more than 50% in 14 months. Source: An article written by The Wall Street Journal that was posted by the Web site Builderonline.com. Read more. 
Pavement
Justice and his colleague, Jon Hansen, senior vice president, local paving (seen above, standing), taught the class. Because of the high attendance and success of these classes, MCM plans to hold additional training classes in the near future. For more information, contact Ken Justice at kjustice@nrmca.org. NRMCA Vice President, Local Paving, Phil Kresge recently participated in the Federal Highway Administration's (FHWA) Mid-Atlantic Region Quality Assurance Workshop in Dover, DE. The presentation had a particular focus on the impact that improper preparation and handling can have on the concrete cylinders' compressive strength test results. Kresge addressed the issue by discussing NRMCA’s Codes and Standards Requirements for Acceptance Testing in the workshop session. Kresge’s involvement was facilitated by his NRMCA colleague Ken Justice, Senior Director, Local Paving, and co-chair of the QAW Concrete Session. In its 51st year, the Mid-Atlantic Quality Assurance Workshop is an annual event devoted to the latest information on highway materials. The Mid-Atlantic Region includes the state of Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia. For more information, contact Phil Kresge at pkresge@nrmca.org. NRMCA’s Local Paving engineers and the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) will present the 2-day Design of Concrete Pavements course in Salt Lake City beginning July 19. This course will provide instruction on how to design and detail concrete pavements used in highways, streets and parking lots by considering the traffic loads, soil conditions and resulting pavement stresses. In addition to designing conventional concrete pavements, it will also provide introductions for innovative products such as pervious concrete, concrete overlays and roller compacted concrete. Concrete thickness design will be presented from multiple design methodologies including both empirical and mechanistic-empirical procedures. Discussions of subgrade characterization and improvement as well as pavement jointing will also be provided. Concrete materials will be presented, including discussions on strength, workability and durability. Additional detail will be provided on economic life cycle cost analysis (LCCA) and environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) of concrete pavements. Typical construction techniques for conventional concrete pavements and overlay as well as the unique techniques used for pervious and roller compacted concrete will be reviewed. Development and application of materials and construction specifications and the related quality control and acceptance tests will be highlighted in terms of meeting the design objectives. Click here to register and, for more information, contact Amanda Hult at ahult@nrmca.org. 
Engineering
The next NRMCA Concrete Durability Course will be offered on May 22-24, 2018 at the Brookhaven College in Farmers Branch (Dallas area), TX. The course is taught by Michael Thomas, University of New Brunswick, Kevin Folliard, University of Texas at Austin and NRMCA Engineering staff. The course provides a fundamental understanding of the nature of cement and concrete as they relate to durability of concrete. Topics will cover cracking, alkali aggregate reactions, sulfate attack, corrosion of reinforcing steel, freeze-thaw durability and other aspects. A group exercise will be facilitated to familiarize attendees with NRMCA's Concreteworks software used for mass concrete and service life prediction. The course also discusses the durability provisions in the Building Code - ACI 318-14 and how specifications can be structured to address durability. Comprehensive reference material is provided as course notes that is an excellent resource to concrete producers and associated technical personnel. Those with the NRMCA Level 3 Certification obtain the NRMCA Concrete Technologist Level 4 Certification when passing the exam offered with the course. It is not essential to have attended the NRMCA Technical Short Course to attend the Durability Course. The course provides required learning units toward the technical track of the NRMCA STEPS certification program. Persons interested in attending this course are encouraged to register as soon as possible. Click here for registration options and more infomation. 
April 18, Silver Spring, MD May 22 – 24, Dallas May 23, Bozeman, MT September 29 – October 1, Metro Washington, DC December 11 – 14, Austin, TX Calendar
*Please note that e-mail and direct links to each event listed below can be accessed from NRMCA's Web site. March 14 – 15, Bloomington, MN March 15, Atlanta March 27 – 29, Silver Spring, MD March 27 – 30, Louisville, KY Sold Out April 10 – 12, Orlando, FL 
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Two days of training classes were held in Manhattan, KS, at the request of NRMCA members Midwest Concrete Materials (MCM) and Ash Grove Cement, reports NRMCA Senior Director, Local Paving, Ken Justice. The first day’s training was geared toward contractors and inspectors, and concentrated on placing and finishing techniques. There were over 55 participants, including many from the city of Manhattan and surrounding municipalities. The training included a classroom session as well as a live concrete placement. The second day was geared toward the design professionals and consisted of concrete design basics as well as a demonstration of the new pavement design software package, Pavementdesigner.com. There were 17 design professionals from both private and public entities in attendance. Many discussions broke out during the breaks and at the end of the classes, and led to a request from Kansas State University for a follow up meeting on the following day after the classes to discuss its parking lots.