NRMCA e-news

National Ready Mixed Concrete Association

Why We Fight for Concrete: NRMCA Chairman Presents Ready Mix Industry Viewpoint

NRMCA Board Chairman Allen Hamblen has written an opinion essay titled Why We Fight for Concrete that was sent to media outlets in the Pacific Northwest. The News Tribune of Tacoma, WA, the state's second largest newspaper, posted the essay. Mr. Hamblen's essay was posted on the paper's Web site March 25. In addition to serving on NRMCA's Board, Mr. Hamblen is president and CEO of NRMCA Producer member CalPortland Company, which is the largest ready mixed concrete producer in Washington State. Read more.

PAVEMENTS

NRMCA Reassigns Local Paving Staff to Cover U.S. Regions

Seeking opportunities in the pavement market for ready mix products has been and continues to be the primary focus of the local paving division at NRMCA. This division consists of seven staff members located across the country whose primary focus is working with NRMCA member companies, state affiliate associations, public and private owners, engineers and architects to find these opportunities and see that ready mix materials are utilized for long-term, durable pavements on local projects.

To be most effective, NRMCA has redistributed the regional assignments for the local paving staff. Effective immediately, Senior Vice President Julie Buffenbarger will manage states in the Northeast, Phil Kresge, senior director, will be responsible for the eastern seaboard, Amanda Hult, senior director, will be in the Southeast, Senior Director Doug O"Neill will be in the Midwest and Senior Vice President Jon Hansen will cover the western states. Senior Vice President Glenn Ochsenreiter will continue to manage the Design Assistance Program and other projects associated with the promotion of ready mix products and Senior Vice President and Division Head Brian Killingsworth will continue to lead and manage all local paving efforts.

Click here to see the states in each region with the corresponding local paving staff. Staff contact information can be found here. For more information, contact Brian Killingsworth or the local paving staff in your region.

NRMCA Announces Winners of Promotion Awards

The NRMCA Promotion Committee is pleased to announce that Zach Rich of Silvi Concrete and Andrew Marks of the Puget Sound Concrete Specification Council (PSCSC) will receive 2016 NRMCA promotion awards on April 12 at the Annual Convention in San Diego. Rich will receive the Promoter of the Year Award which recognizes outstanding concrete promotion contributions by an employee of one of NRMCA’s Producer members. His noteworthy accomplishments over many years of excellent service to our industry include conversion of more than 1.6 million square feet of planned asphalt projects to concrete during 2013/2014; specifier outreach efforts that added several hundred thousand square feet of additional parking lot business in 2015 and three semesters as a concrete adjunct professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology’s Concrete in Management (CIM) Program.

Andrew Marks will be presented with the Affiliate Promoter of the Year Award for noteworthy concrete promotion contributions by an employee of one of NRMCA’s affiliate partner organizations. Mark’s accomplishments with PSCSC include two projects now moving forward following years of effort: Port of Tacoma Road and the Logistics NW Building, including concrete floors, walls and parking areas. These two projects alone represent more than 24,000 cubic yards of concrete, with Mark’s successful projects for PSCSC approaching 850,000 square yards in total.

For more information about NRMCA’s Promotion Awards, please contact Glenn Ochsenreiter at glenn@nrmca.org.

NRMCA Needs Photos of Your Projects

NRMCA's Local Paving group is working to update its Case Studies of projects that were designed through the Design Assistance Program (DAP). If you have a project that has been constructed, please send Amanda Hult photographs of the finished project so that they may be included in future presentations and publications. "It’s great when we can show potential customers projects throughout the United States that have been designed through the DAP and then constructed," Hult said. "I was just in Minnesota last week and had a photo in the presentation of a project that was constructed in 1998. One of the attendees recognized the location and provided me with an updated photo. What a powerful message we can tell about the lifespan of concrete pavements through photos taken years apart."

Submit your DAP project information and photographs to Amanda at ahult@nrmca.org.

BUILDINGS

Study Finds Insurance Is Six Times Higher for Wood Frame Construction

A new study of the property insurance costs for wood frame and concrete multi-family residential buildings conducted by GLOBE Advisors and sponsored by the Concrete Council of Canada reveals a substantial gap in the risks and insurance rates between the two building systems. The data for the study "Insurance Costs for Mid-Rise Wood Frame and Concrete Residential Buildings" was drawn from relevant published literature and consultations with brokers, underwriters and property managers. Interviews with three underwriters and data from the Canadian Wood Council (CWC) show that builders' risk insurance rates per $100 monthly for comparable wood and concrete buildings are on average $0.008 for concrete and $0.053 for wood. (Download the Executive Summary and the full study.)

NRMCA has resources to help members and state affiliates to take advantage of information like this to advocate for concrete construction, including developing legislation, talking points, public relations and other key strategies.

To learn more about how NRMCA can assist in state advocacy, please contact Senior Director of State and Local Government Affairs John Loyer at 703-675-7603 or jloyer@nrmca.org.

Texas Counties Offer Rebates for Storm Shelters

The West Central Texas Council of Governments (WCTCOG) recently announced the West Central Texas Residential Safe Room Rebate Program funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) through the Governor’s Division of Emergency Management (GDEM). More tornadoes have been recorded in Texas than in any other state, partly due to the state's size. Nearly 62.7 percent of all Texas tornadoes occurred within the coming three-month period of April, May and June. The WCTCOG program will provide homeowners, developers and builders a rebate of up to $3,000 to offset the cost of installing an ATSA/NSSA-certified safe room/storm shelter in a residence. The rules require that the home be a single-family dwelling that lies outside a FEMA or locally mapped floodplain. For the purpose of this program and because it is a requirement of the GDEM, any unit on which a rebate is paid under this program must be certified by the American Tornado Shelter Association (ATSA) or National Storm Shelter Association (NSSA). The States of Arkansas, Ohio, Alabama and Oklahoma also have similar programs.

While safe rooms and storm shelters can be made of many different materials, concrete storm shelter provides superior safety from even the most violent tornadoes, meeting FEMA standards. Concrete producers are encouraged to work with local developers to take advantage of this resilient feature and offer peace of mind for new homebuyers.

Click here for more details. For more information, contact Tien Peng at 206-913-8535 or tpeng@nrmca.org.

ENGINEERING

Latest Edition of NC2 E-NEWS is Now Online

The March 2016 edition of the NC2 E-News, the newsletter of the Long-Term Plan for Concrete Pavement Research and Technology, is now online. This issue includes briefs titled Moving Advancements into Practice with the topic on recycled concrete aggregate in concrete mixtures and discusses production methods, uses, benefits and properties.

The next NRMCA Concrete Durability Course is scheduled for June 6-8, 2016, at the RMC Research & Education Foundation Center next to the NRMCA office in Silver Spring, MD. 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 walk attendees through ConcreteWorks software that can be used to develop concrete mixtures for durability and to evaluate the potential for temperature-related cracking.

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. The course concludes with a comprehensive exam on the subject matter covered. Those with NRMCA Level 3 Certification will obtain the NRMCA Concrete Technologist Level 4 Certification when passing this exam. However, it is not essential to have attended the NRMCA Technical Short Course to attend the Durability Course.

This course provides required learning units toward the technical track of the NRMCA STEPS certification program. Please register early if you wish to attend.

Click here for registration options, more information and staff contacts.

TRB to Hold Webinar on Minimizing Risk of Early Age Cracking in Concrete

The Transportation Research Board (TRB) has scheduled a Webinar on Wednesday, May 25, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. Eastern time on explaining how minimizing cracking can extend the service life of various structures and will illustrate real life applications of crack reduction in design and construction. This Webinar is organized by the TRB Standing Committee on Concrete Materials and Placement Techniques. Participants must register in advance and there is a fee for non-TRB Sponsor or non-TRB Sustaining Affiliate employees. A certificate for 1.5 Professional Development Hours (PDHs) will be provided to attendees who register and attend the Webinar as an individual.

Webinar presenters include Doug Hooton, University of Toronto; Jason Weiss, Oregon State University and Don Streeter, New York Department of Transportation. The Webinar will cover various causes of cracking and ways to minimize it; new ways to avoid and minimize cracking and practical applications to minimizing cracking. The final 30 minutes will be reserved for audience questions.

Click here for more information and to register.

OPERATIONS, ENVIRONMENTAL, SAFETY & HR

OSHA Finalizes New Silica Exposure Standard

Last week, the Department of Labor’s (DOL) Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) finalized a new standard for exposure to respirable crystalline silica. While NRMCA is still analyzing all 606 pages in the rule, it appears that many of the concerns the industry voiced with the proposal were held over into the final rule. Specifically, the rule halves the permissible expose limit (PEL) from 100 μg/m3 (micrograms per cubic meter of air) to 50 μg/m3. The rule also contains an action level of 25 μg/m3, which would trigger employee medical surveillance. As well, the rule will require, in part:

1. Limiting employees access to areas with an exposure potential above the new PEL;

2. Respiratory protection for employees exposed to levels above the PEL when other controls cannot be used;

3. Specific housekeeping requirements;

4. A new written exposure control plan;

5. Employee medical exams and surveillance;

6. Recordkeeping requirements; and

7. Employee training.

The compliance date for the rule’s provisions is June 23, 2018. However, employee medical surveillance won’t be required until June 23, 2020. NRMCA will be working closely with the Operations, Environmental and Safety Committee Safety Task Group to compile and draft compliance assistance materials for the industry.

Click here to view OSHA’s silica Web page.
Click here to view OSHA’s overview.
Click here to view OSHA’s Factsheet.
Click here to view OSHA’s FAQs.
Click here to view OSHA’s Stakeholder Factsheet.
Click here to view the final rule.

For more information, contact Gary Mullings at gmullings@nrmca.org or Kevin Walgenbach at kwalgenbach@nrmca.org.

Federal Labor Officials Finalize Employee Union Election "Persuader" Rule

Last week, the Department of Labor (DOL) published its long-awaited and contentious "Persuader" final rule. Originally proposed back in 2011, the Persuader final rule now requires employers to disclose when they seek legal advice before an employee union election or campaign. Prior to finalizing the rule, an employer was only required to disclose this information when a legal advisor had direct communication with employees regarding their union elections or campaigns. The Coalition for a Democratic Workplace (CDW), of which NRMCA is an active member, is currently reviewing the final rule with an eye toward possible litigation. As the rule continues to be analyzed, NRMCA will relay any updates as they arise.

Click here to view DOL’s Web page on the final rule.
Click here to view DOL’s Overview/Summary.
Click here to view DOL’s Factsheet on the rule.
Click here to view the final rule.

For more information, contact Kevin Walgenbach at kwalgenbach@nrmca.org or Jill Landry at jlandry@nrmca.org.

SUSTAINABILITY

World Renowned Keynote Speakers to Present at 2016 Sustainability Conference

The 2016 Self-Consolidating Conference (SCC) in collaboration with the International Concrete Sustainability Conference (ICSC) will feature keynote speakers addressing cutting edge technologies to help concrete meet rigorous sustainability goals. The conference, scheduled for May 15-18 in suburban Washington, DC, will feature nine keynote speakers across three plenary sessions, including:

• Suru Shah, emeritis professor at Northwestern University, will present constructability, sustainability, and nanotechnology.

• Chris Drew, director of sustainability at Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture, will present the opportunities and challenges for sustainability of tall buildings, including the Jeddah Tower in Saudi Arabia, the tallest building in the world currently under construction.

• Nicolas Roussel, senior researcher at the French Institute of Science and Technology for Transport, Development and Networks, will present new trends in rheology driven by sustainable SCC.

• Olafur Wallevik, professor and director of the Innovation Center Iceland, will present low binder self-consolidating concrete (Eco-SCC) and vibration free stiff concrete (VFC).

In addition, the combined conferences will feature 35 technical sessions with over 200 speakers and posters. Visit www.2016ICSC.org or www.SCC2016.com for detailed speaker lists, abstracts and schedule and to register for both conferences for one low price.

For more information, contact James Bogdan at JBogdan@nrmca.org or 412-420-4138.

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

NRMCA Advocacy News Roundup Updated Through March 25, 2016

Media articles on Congress, transportation infrastructure, regulation, taxes and other subjects, each of which relate to the ready mixed concrete industry, are updated each week by NRMCA's Government Affairs staff. To access the most recent compilation of articles for March 21 - 25, 2016, please click here.

If you would like to receive this weekly updated link in a separate e-mail, or if you have questions or comments about the roundup, contact NRMCA’s Jill Landry at jlandry@nrmca.org.

PRODUCTS & SERVICES

March Internet Spotlight Highlights Technology in Practice Series

The NRMCA March Internet Spotlight, good through Tuesday, April 5, is a single set of the Technology In Practice (TIP) series 1-16. Technology in Practice is a series of short information pieces on important topics written in an easy understandable "What, Why and How?" format, similar to the Concrete In Practice (CIP) topics. It can be used by ready mixed concrete industry personnel to support internal as well as customer education.

Click here to view each topic. Order online today and receive 15% off the regular member single set price of $20 (Internet Special $17, plus shipping). Please use discount code ISMAR16.

CALENDAR

A Look Ahead

*Please note that e-mail and direct links to each event listed below can be accessed from NRMCA's Web site.

April 5 - 8, Birmingham, AL *Sold Out

Plant Manager Certification Course