Funding boost for eco-friendly brick

The multi-award-winning K-briq from Kenoteq

Kenoteq has been awarded almost €1.2 million in funding from Zero Waste Scotland, to scale up production of its eco-friendly K-Briq.

The start-up company, spun out form Edinburgh’s Heriot-Watt University, says the award – part of Scotland’s Circular Economy Investment Fund – will allow it to produce more than two million bricks a year.

The K-Briq is made from more than 90% recycled demolition and construction waste material, while its manufacturing process produces just 10% of the CO2 emissions of traditionally-fired bricks and requires 10% of the energy.

Sam Chapman, managing director of Kenoteq, said, “The construction industry faces a tremendous challenge when meeting decarbonisation goals. The industry sends over 800 million tonnes of waste to landfill in Europe every year, at a huge cost to itself and the environment. In the UK, construction and the built environment accounts for approximately 50% of all waste generated in Scotland.

“The K-Briq presents an opportunity for the construction sector to reduce landfill, limit reliance on finite resources and take advantage of waste materials to create a more sustainable and ecologically viable built environment. The K-Briq slashes energy use, both in its manufacturing process and also once in use as it has double the insulation properties of existing bricks and blocks. By using recycled pigments, it can be made in a range of colours providing flexibility to architects and design planners.

“With this funding, we will scale the manufacturing capacity from a pilot plant to industrial-scale production through development of a new manufacturing line in Scotland. We will then create a template for the provision of production systems to selected waste handling partners across Scotland and the UK.”