GORAZDZE CEMENT SPOLKA AKCYJNA

Their core work

Gorazdze Cement is one of Poland's major industrial cement producers, operating large-scale clinker and cement manufacturing facilities. In EU research, they participate exclusively as a third party — meaning they contribute real industrial infrastructure, operational know-how, and on-site validation capacity rather than conducting research themselves. Their involvement spans two distinct but connected challenges: engineering more durable and eco-friendly concrete products (incorporating industrial by-products), and addressing the cement industry's deep decarbonization problem through carbon capture and utilisation. As an actual cement plant in active production, they provide researchers with something most universities cannot: a real industrial environment to test at meaningful scale.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In their first H2020 project (2018–2021), Gorazdze's involvement centred on the material side of cement: producing more durable, resource-efficient concrete by blending in industrial by-products — a straightforward product improvement angle. By 2021, the focus shifted decisively toward climate: their second project (running to 2026) addresses the full CCUS chain for cement kilns, with specific interest in enzymatic solvents, rotary packed bed absorbers, and concrete recarbonation. This shift mirrors a sector-wide pivot forced by EU carbon pricing — cement producers can no longer treat decarbonisation as a research curiosity, it has become a survival question.

Gorazdze is moving from product-level sustainability (better concrete) toward process-level decarbonisation (capturing CO2 at source), which signals growing strategic commitment to net-zero cement manufacturing rather than marginal improvements.

How they like to work

Gorazdze operates exclusively as a third party in both recorded projects — a role that typically means providing an industrial site, production data, or in-kind validation capacity while the coordinating research institution manages the grant. They do not lead consortia or take on participant responsibilities. Despite this supporting role, their two projects collectively engaged 40 partners across 15 countries, indicating they joined well-connected, large-scale consortia — consistent with major EU industrial demonstration projects where a real cement plant is a required consortium asset.

Across just two projects, Gorazdze has been part of consortia spanning 40 unique partners in 15 countries — an unusually wide network for so few participations, reflecting the large multi-partner structure of the IA and RIA projects they joined. Their network is pan-European with no single geographic cluster apparent from the data.

What sets them apart

Gorazdze is one of very few actual cement producers in the H2020 database, which makes them rare and valuable: they offer what no research institute can replicate — access to a working cement plant as a validation and demonstration site. For any consortium developing CCUS technology for cement, or testing new concrete formulations at industrial scale, having Gorazdze as a third party provides immediate credibility with reviewers and a real-world proving ground. Their positioning is as an industrial host, not a research contributor.

Highlights from their portfolio

• ACCSESS
  A major 2021–2026 Innovation Action targeting affordable, flexible CCUS across multiple hard-to-abate industries including cement — one of the most strategically important EU decarbonisation challenges, with Gorazdze likely providing the cement plant demonstration site.
• EnDurCrete
  An earlier Research and Innovation Action on eco-friendly durable concrete integrating industrial by-products, signalling Gorazdze's early engagement with circular economy approaches to cement production.