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A Pretty Stunning Graph of World Cement Production (and China is Certainly Using It)
Posted by Prof. Goose on June 20, 2008 - 6:00am
Topic: Economics/Finance
Tags: cement, china, coal, concrete, electricity, india, original, peak oil, russia [list all tags]
Annual production of cement by country in billions of metric tons. Click to expand. Source: USGS 2006 report (PDF) and the USGS 2008 report (PDF).
Cement is mainly used to make concrete, and is sort of the "active ingredient" in concrete - it is combined with sand and gravel in roughly fixed proportions. So cement production can be considered a rough proxy for the total amount of construction going on in a country.
This post updates Stuart's post about this two years ago (and yes, it's still a graph that will blow you away!) with two more years of USGS cement data, 2006 and 2007. The growth in China, from 1 GT to 1.3 GT in two years is mindboggling, even India and Russia are interesting...and there's more to think about under the fold.
edited to add: As a couple of folks pointed out--I have interchanged "production" and "usage" in this post incorrectly--however, China's 2007 cement exports were only 33 million tons out of 1.3 billion tons produced. So, at least for China, production is a good proxy for demand/consumption. My apologies for the mistake.
Percentage of yearly worldwide cement usage. Click to expand. Source: USGS 2006 report and the USGS 2008 report.
Some things we learned from the comment thread from Stuart's post a couple of years ago:
Remember, in China, oil isn't used in cement production. In the "clinker" stage, it's all coal. In the blending stage it's electricity (which is generated 80% from coal in China).
And cement production in China is inefficient. There are hundreds of small plants, both wet and dry processes, and the local environmental impact is severe.
Making a pound of cement releases a pound of CO2. And a Gigaton or two?
This also isn't a new phenomenon. This link shows data back to 1999 that illustrated that China has been at this for quite a while, but perhaps not to this extent.
To conclude, here is the percent change of production bar graph from 2005 to 2008. Think about what all that means in terms of energy. Also note the numbers from India, Russia, and the US.
Percentage growth in cement consumption 2005-2008. Click to expand. Source: USGS 2006 report and the USGS 2008 report.
Looks like India has a lot of catching up to do.
I have no definite idea what what they are building in there but I think our western paranoia would lend this jolly dog of a 'tune' of Tom Waites an ear:)
Those are amazing graphs, I think I can smell the smoke from China from here. That decrease in US cement consumption ... right up there with Indonesia?
How much cement is used in the new nuclear reactors being built in China?
----
edit: code above fixed.
Well, one of things that the graph doesn't tell you is this: they are buying up as much of the high quality clinker (what's produced from the cement kiln prior to it's grinding into the fine powder than you and I think of as cement) and stockpiling it. Although the surface of clinker will react with water, it is a way to store it for a long time. Note; the Chinese are also doing the same with steel. I suspect they know that one day the energy issues will become the real choke point (for production and transport) that when the JIT world comes to a grinding halt, they won't.
Even more fascinating (not in the USGS data) is the incremental cost profit and trading of cement clinker. I'm aware of several cement plants that quarry the raw materials and make the cement clinker which they send, by rail, down to ocean going barge transport to China. Those same companies then import from other countries (notably from the African continent) clinker produced and shipped from overseas. That clinker is then transported back to the cement production facility where it is ground and then sold as cement within it's distribution area (nominally about a 500 mile radius). The Chinese are buying the US production at a slightly higher cost than the clinker imported by the US companies and that goes to an increased profitability.
Neat trick. There can be some tradeoffs, however, to the clinker chemical makeup.
(Note: I teach a 3-5 day course on everything you'd never like to know about cement production).
Teach us, oh wise one. And yes, I am serious.
When you start thinking about the implications of this stuff...oooof...so I wanna learn. Bring it.
Great, where do I sign up? It's why I read this site, it is just chocka-block full of all the things I just don't want to know about:)
Hey Starship not only do you have me reading 'things I don't want to read about' but also looking for more! How are you on types of cement? Two reasons, first I found this quote below in Wikipedia and noticed the mention of "low-energy" cements would you elucidate?
Calcium sulfoaluminate cements are made from clinkers that include ye’elimite (Ca4(AlO2)6SO4 or C4A3\bar \mathrm{S} in Cement chemist’s notation) as a primary phase. They are used in expansive cements, in ultra-high early strength cements, and in "low-energy" *cements.
Second reason is that years ago I used a black cement in a bit of sculpture, I was told at the time that it wasn't Portland and no colourants were added. I have no idea what it was but it was great stuff, does this poor description ring any bell? Have asked at various local cement purveyors to be only met with a concrete and stony silence.
*my bold
Hey CrystalRadio- your "black cement" is actually fly ash concrete, an inexpensive alternative to Portland. It is easily manipulated when wet, but requires little water- great for sculpture, it is also environmentally friendly because it is recycled from the remnants of coal production. Gives a smooth finish, but sharp detail.
Yes please, if you have the material prepared I would really appreciate a post.
Cement is a key example to use in explaining how it can all go wrong. Clinker production and distribution requires a lot of fossil fuel input, and causes 5-7% of AGW gases worldwide. The transition to solar/nuclear/wind and buildout of New Urbanism will require unprecedented amounts of concrete. Obviously, some foresight and resource allocation is required!
Building with (steel-reinforced) concrete is one of the most silly things, mankind ever invented. If you have insight into the static of concrete constructions, e.g.
and if you consider further
you with all kinds of spores of fungus that grow in airtight environment,
, if you take all this and you think about the fact that the worlds biggest concrete manufacturer, the swiss Holcim group, which is responsible for the devastation of vast natural mountains and ecosystems, the polution of air and water, won for the third time in a row the title "Leader of the Industry" of Dow Jones Sustainable Index, that civil engineers don't even learn of alternatives in the university, just concrete, steel and wood, if they have luck (but wood is already a scarce ressource and no alternative, once the energy lacks), and not even hear about the fantastic possibilities of mud and adobe,
and if you take all the other reasons and examples, than you can only hope that Peak Oil is also Peak Concrete!
P.S. I decided to write a book it, because no one knows about all this, everone takes concrete for granted and "natural". This is a very important peak-oil-issue!
Yours Snomm
Concrete is WAY too energy intensive of a product for most applications. However, there are too many fallacies in this comment to ignore.
1. needlessly complicated structures exist in steel and wood form, too
2. point is unclear, but again, how is this specific to concrete?
3. same comments as 2.
4. concrete does hold together. It functions much better as a compressive material, though, which is why when there are tensile (or high shear) stresses, steel is added. There are a lot of unreinforced concrete structures. I've heard comments from a concrete guru that reinforcing any slab on grade is ludicrous.
5. concrete doesn't have to break before it works. Not sure where you're interpretation comes from, but it's off base. Reinforced concrete structures are designed for ductile failure as a safety precaution for users. This means that the concrete is expected to crack at points of high tensile stress. Engaging the steel will result in obvious indicators should the structure begin to fail. Without this, the structure would fail in a brittle fashion, which means that once the breaking point was reached, the whole thing would come crashing down on anybody who happened to be under it.
6. all structural materials in their virgin state will decompose when subjected to the elements. And it's salt transported by water that rusts the steel, not the water itself. This is one of the reasons that structures have building envelopes; to protect the materials holding up the building.
7. Uhh huh, and...
8. .. this is why concrete is mostly appropriate for large loads and long spans. Try building a multi-story building out of rammed earth.
9. wait, what?
10. Okay, woah, this has to do with building design and is again entirely independent of the structural material.
11. concrete a conductor? listen, one of the advantages of concrete is that it absorbs heat during the day and relases it slowly during the night. same as adobe.
12. agreed, unless, hold on, wait for it, you wear gloves and a mask. -gasp-! oh the horrors!! Forget abhu graib, let's go after concrete construction sites!!! Seriously, don't trivialize the word torture.
13. Call the selkirk hospital, one got loose
14. agreed
15. not even close, brother. Take a look at http://www.canadianarchitect.com/issues/ISarticle.asp?id=143336&story_id...
or do a search for fabric formed concrete.
Let's not forget that concrete has made it possible for dense urban life. Without concrete and modern steel, we'd still be limited to buildings of a handful of stories in height.
Above ground concrete exposed to the elements may be more susceptible to spalling. This is due to rapid changes in temperature such as between night and day. The expansion and contraction of the material will cause cracking and chipping. Water gets down into the cracks and rusts the rebar or freezes and thaws creating enlarging cracks. Spalling can tear down a granite mountain face over eons of time, or a city high rise balcony exposed to the weather within 50 years.
12. umm.... Having worked on several concrete jobs, it only effects some people. I can bathe in wet cement and not be in the least distressed by it. Others need gloves.
Concrete has been used for a very long time, and when properly designed, lasts many centuries. The Pantheon is an example. The most commonly used type is Portland cement, invented in 1829. Some of the first PC structures are still in use. Many alternatives have been tried before and since. Some are better, but require more skill, quality control, and energy to make. And to borrow Matt Simmons' line, it costs 8 cents per pound. What else can you buy for that?
For a few thousand years, mankind built mostly with stone and earth, and lyme and wood. Then, with the beginning of the fossil fuel age, some smart guy figured that if he crushed the stone, burned it in an oil or coal oven with a few more components, and packed it, he could sell it for a much higher price as a sort of "fast stone", once mixed with sand and water. Not just a binder like lyme mortar, but something that could be shaped and stand for itself. And marvel people at it's tensile strenght, once reinforced with steel. Never mind that stone itself would last and be useful for thousands of years, and "fast stone" only for around fifty.
Cheap fuels, both for fabrication and transport, enabled the thing to spread and indeed form the basic material of the infrastructure of industrial society, in a widespread manner since WWII. Every wonder of the modern(ist) world, from high rises to suburbia, autobahns to war bunkers, Corbusier to Zaha Hadid, would not exhist without concrete. It is present in a most obvious form in Brutalist architecture, but without it as foundations even steel and glass high rises or humble mac mansions would not exhist as they do. Concrete can even claim direct responsability in hundred's of thousands of deaths in earthquakes around the world in recent decades, as you could verify recently in China. People were crushed under piles of concrete plaques from buildings past their (short lived) safety age, or built without any respect for the laws of tectonics and safety, something that concrete enables like no other building technique.
Both materially and symbolically, concrete embodies the futility and aimlessness of industrial civilization. Short lived but lucrative for industry, archtecturally amorphous but able to be shaped to the whims of one high priest of modernism after another, concrete stands as a more visible proof of the futility of the oil, or fossil fuel, age, than extensive motoring or aviation, and yet it has been "taken for granted and natural", as Snomm remarks in his excellent post above. As it's dawn aproaches, together with Peak Oil and the Age of Incredibly Stupid Use of Resources, we will be left with a mass of decaying structures around the planet, uninhabitable by societies that can no longer occupy the land like they did in the times of oil utopia.
Our construction habbits show very good, how things went wrong the last 200 years.
Its not just the concrete material, but also, how our buildings are organized. Umgrego2 campaigns for concrete and steel, because otherwise "we'd still be limited to buildings of a handful of stories in height". First, he hasn't maybe ever heard of Shibam, the yemen town with 16 stories high earth buildings, that last since ~1500 years (your Manhattan was a virgin forest, when these buildings were constructed), second, he has maybe never heard of studies, that found out that people feel uncomfortable when they get beyond two stories. Third, and here I come to my point, he has maybe never imagined the enormeous efforts that are required to pump water in the 30th story (the energy).
Modern houses and homes are not only buildings that stand for themselves. They are part of a machinery that comprises powerhouses, clarification plants, water pumping facilities, district heating systems and, dependend on the complexity of the structure, maybe a lot more. And all this machinery is run with fossil fuels.
And, Umgrego2, concrete has to crack, to work, I am pretty shure and I don't know your guru, but I never put concrete in place without steel reinforcement, because, (1) compression alone does not exist, it comes always along with transversal tension (I hope this word is right, it means that you have always tension perpendicular to the compression direction). And (2) concrete destroys itself because of shrinkage if it is not helped by steel to stay together. Concrete is NOT a stone or fast stone or how you call it. This thinking is widespread, but wrong!! Think of it rather as a cake, you take the dough, pour it in a form and bake it. After you retreat it of the four, it falls (a little bit) together. The same is true for concrete. After it has reacted with water, it falls together, it shrinks. The reinforcement necessary to prevent this shrinkage is often the most important, much more important than the one you need to take external forces.
Concrete constructions are in truth steel constructions, were a little bit of steel is economized by replacing it with concrete. This is the truth. I have never seen old stone cathedrals, where the stone had to be helped with steel to fall apart...
And, Umgrego2, I know, my english is not as good as yours, but I don't understand comments like Uhh Ahh (maybe this is american slang?), you should be more specific ;-)
AntiPortland, if you read french I have a very good article where they compare the seismic behavior of concrete and adobe constructions. Its in the internet, I will post it than because I have to leave now - the concrete is waiting...
-Snomm
Snomm, I do read french, email me at albertocastro.nunes@gmail.com, maybe we can also share a few ideas about concrete et al
Indeed, and to think that of all the people in the world the Chinese had both the technology, the knowledge and a wonderful natural resource to do do things differently. I am sure their house of cards, er cement, will collapse and come tumbling down. After all their exponential growth is just as unsustainable as anyone one else's.
http://www.koolbamboo.com/7-ZERI-Projects.pdf
"Grow Your Own House": Bamboo as a Construction Material
Bamboo (Vegetable Steel)
We need radical new ideas for housing. For example, one of the best structural materials available
in abundance is bamboo. It has a matrix of ligno-cellulose, which provides better tensile and
compression strength than iron. There are many bamboo species, growing around the world.
Bamboos, such as Guadua Angustifolia, have been used extensively as construction material in
poverty-stricken regions.
Man, some of you should do some learning before all the babbling. Concrete construction is a Roman (Empire, eg. 2000+ yrs ago) invention and it's development had nothing at all to do with fossil petroleum (<200 yrs). Concrete structure is a relatively energy efficient way to build multi-floor structures compared to steel, and I'd thought we mostly agreed that the sprawl of low-density housing which requires increased transportation was less acceptable than high-density dwelling systems? If bamboo is so great for structures, why do most asian constructions build all their scafoldings on construction sites with it, pour the concrete, then tear down the bamboo scaffoldings? Perhaps they've learned one or two things you've overlooked?
lengould said: "Man, some of you should do some learning before all the babbling."
I have to clarify something here, maybe you did not read exactly our postings:
There is a big difference between concrete and steel reinforced concrete. The Romans built with concrete, the most popular structure is the Pantheon. Why does it still stand? I wrote that (reinforced!) concrete has to crack to work and that shrinkage will destroy it. Have I forgotten my words and do I make propaganda for love and sex and mud?
The truth is, the Pantheon is a cupola-construction made of concrete, not steel-reinforced concrete. All forces in a cupola are compression forces. It can shrink as much as it wants, there is always compression. This structure is VERY different from so-called modern steel-reinforced structures, which are, as I wrote above, steel structures in their heart. And steel-reinforced concrete has A LOT to do with fossil fuels, I would say, its all about that!!
Steel-reinforced concrete exists since... no, not 2000 years, but since 1861, when good old Joseph Monier put some steel-bars in its flower boxes of concrete, and you know, why he did this? I bet that each time, he watered his flowers, all the liquids inside came running out of the box, because concrete shrinks and cracks and these cracks go from one end to the other.
Why do the chinese don't build any longer with bamboo? Have they learned one or two things that I overlooked? You know, what happened in Germany, when cheap fossil fuels became available and burned bricks got cheap? Before they built their homes with adobe and earth, than they saw these nice bricks and certainly also the advertisement, and they cut the roof, and the highest story and rebuilt it with brick. And you know what happened? The structure beneath deformed (it didn't rupture, it was not concrete, but natural products) and became inhabitable.
People sometimes don't want the best, but the most "modern", the most "in", the latest i-pod, or phone. I have nothing overlooked, I am in this since years... sorry, but I am not babbling
-Snomm
Your logic is a bit weak there grasshopper. If bamboo wasn't so great for structures (or are you saying scaffolding isn't a structure), maybe it wouldn't be used for that purpose. Do go and do some learning yourself, you could start by reading the link I supplied. See what the German civil engineers had to say about about the ZERI Pavillion designed by architect Simon Velez, maybe you think he should do some learning before he starts to babble,right?
Anyways SNOMM has already given a polite and cogent reply as to one possible reason the Chinese, and others may prefer the use of steel reinforced concrete and glass towers over more natural and less energy intensive options such as bamboo. Maybe it's the same reason some people prefer to defend their use of SUVs over bicycles. Yes, the owners of the SUVs may have learned a thing or two over the proponents of bicycle use, but then again they may still have a few things to learn, like sustainability and being integrated with their local ecosystems. So yes, learning and thinking outside those concrete and steel boxes is a good thing. Too bad you don't seem to able to do it yourself.
Ride a Bike or Take a Hike.
Cheers!
I'm not 'campaigning for concrete and steel'. I think they're appropriate for certain scenarios. For example, supporting urban density. No, I hadn't hear of Shibam. Sounds like a nice place to visit. Not sure where your '16 stories high' fact comes from. Wikipedia lists the tallest structure as being 11 stories. And although the city is 2000 years old, the buildings are "from the 16th century ..." and "... have been rebuilt over and over again during the last few centuries." Manhattan is not mine. It was, however, started in the 17th C., so I guess Shibam wins by one century, but I'm not sure what the contest is.
Also, it appears that the buildings in Shibam are timber structures with earth envelopes. The buildings are not supported by the earthen portion of the building.
No, I haven't heard of "studies, that found out that people feel uncomfortable when they get beyond two stories". Where are they?
Yes, I am aware that water needs to be pumped up to the top of a building. And, people need to be hoisted. I think there are more efficient ways of tackling these issues than those that are currently employed, but the current use of pumps doesn't support the idea that concrete is a poor building material.
The machinery in the "powerhouses, clarification plants, water pumping facilities, district heating systems" are powered by whatever the local source is. Where I live, it's electricity generated by a dam. For others it's nuclear, or coal, or solar, or wind ....
Back to the cracks. I orginally thought you understood structures enough to be commenting on cracks from loading in tensile zones. Now I understand that you're referring to shrinkage cracks. Shrinkage cracks can be managed through the curing process, additives, or tensile elements, like steel bars, steel mesh, or fibers. The fibers can be anything from steel, polymers, or even straw. But concrete does not 'have to crack to work'. If you manage shrinkage cracks, the concrete still has the same strength. If you don't manage shrinkage cracks, it will still have the same strength.
There are indeed structural elements that only see compression stresses. That's how masonry structures are built.
Concrete does not destroy itself because of shrinkage. What gave you that idea?
Good analogy on pointing out the difference between a masonry unit and concrete. Essentially, though, concrete is very similar to masonry with mortar at the joints. Concrete just has smaller units (the aggregate), which are allowed to arrange in a random pattern instead of being individually placed.
Concrete construction and steel construction are completely different. Concrete is a brittle substance that is most efficient at carrying compressive loads. Steel is elastic (to a certain point) and is more efficient at carrying tensile loads. The marriage of the two was an exercise in material consrvation. For example, a suspended floor built entirely of concrete would have a limited span. If a floor is built strictly of steel, it is very difficult to control vibrations and make the space comfortable for the user.
I didn't asy Uhh Ahh, I said Uhh Huh, which means that I agree. As I stated at the beginning of my previous post, I think that cement production wastes too much energy. This is why I don't think that concrete is appropriate in all applications. Certain soil conditions certainly require concrete foundations. And it is more efficient to build towers using a combination of concrete and steel.
Hi
There are two types of cracks: (1) From shrinking and (2) from external forces. Theoretically you could dimension e.g. a simple beam without (2)-cracks, because concrete can take small tensile stresses (2-3 N/mm2), but then the steel inside is not activated and you spend too much money for the concrete. This is why I write that (reinforced) concrete has to crack to work. Cracks from shrinkage come always when the concrete, once hardened, can not deform. If it can deform, you don't have cracks from shrinkage. But in constructions, there are always a million places, where the concrete cannot deform. This is why there are always cracks.
Your example of Shibam, who rebuild their city regularely, let me think about one important point that I forgot: Reinforced concrete structures cannot be repaired! Look once at the mess that produces, when a rc-structure is demolished. Never you can exchange parts. When the steel is gone, the only thing you can do is to glue FRP-strips outside of the part. Your guess how long that lasts...?
-Snomm
So, let me get this right...
We sell this stuff to China, and then buy it from Africa...?
OK, and another (perhaps not so) dumb question to follow: Why wouldn't China just buy from Africa? I mean, if clinker is cheaper from Africa than the US (to the point that cement companies make more money by importing it from Africa than making it locally), why not scoop all that supply up first *before* buying from the US?
I guess I don't see the logic in what the Chinese are doing...
Right.
Because they like the quality of our clinker compared to the African clinker (another reason which I didn't elaborate on is that of cement type, which is combination of chemical make up and burn temperature). Most cement is "Type I." Type II has a slightly different chemical makeup and is "burned" at a much higher temperature (harder on the kiln refractory, particularly at the end of a production campaign when the kiln will be rebricked).
A good basic site for info is:
http://www.cement.org/basics/
You bring up an interesting point. I've been talking about hoarding (leaving it in the ground) in regard to oil itself for a while now. But hoarding (stockpiling, whatever you want call it) is bound to start occurring in all things strategic connected to or dependent on energy. This can cause things to develop much more quickly than one would otherwise project.
And yes, PG is right. Maybe an article on cement and concrete and its energy and environmental consequences?
Since you know all (or close to it compared to the rest of us):
How much of the increases in coal and nuclear power plant production costs is due to higher cement cost?
As energy becomes more expensive can we partially compensate by creating cement that lasts longer with a smaller increase in energy needed to make the cement than the amount of cement and energy saved later when the cement lasts longer?
Do you see mineral limitations coming into play to limit cement production? If so, when?
Well, any increase in cost in materials will ultimately be reflected in the final cost of construction. Steel prices have soared over the past few years and are as much of a contributor to increased cost as anything else.
The minimum energy requirement per ton (or Mg) of clinker is the amount required to dry the materials, calcine the carbonate to oxide (CaCO3 to CaO) and the amount to raise the temperature of the calcined mixture to the reaction temperature of the mixure of calcium, silica, alumina, and iron (that reaction is exothermic). Beyond that, it's the type of cement process and to some extent the type of cement that dictates the overall energy requirement. The most energy efficient is the precalciner/short kiln and the least is wet kiln.
But as I think I pointed out in a previous post, the choice between wet and dry is usually the largest energy difference. But that choice is governed by conditions of the raw materials and to some extent the chemistry.
The only raw material limitation I see on the horizon is the energy source (gas or coal). Limestone probably isn't a problem (though the contamination with MgCO3 and other single valence alkalies must also be limited), and sand, clay (sources of alumina and silica) and iron oxide won't be problems.
It's not necessarily a simple issue balancing these cross-cutting interests. There is a facility that I've evaluated that has relatively high energy requirements because it's a wet-process kiln and it has a relatively high alkali content (potassium) feed material but it provides not only cement but, because of it's design, potash as an agricultural supplement.
Hi ST!
Does the use of Fly ash offer the possibility of greatly reducing the energy input to concrete?
http://www.natick.army.mil/soldier/jocotas/ColPro_Papers/Anderson.pdf
Anderson.pdf
No, not really. Flyashes with high calcium content will be precalcined by the combustion process (i.e., the it exists as CaO in the ash) and they can be added to the feed material to augment the calcium requirement. We have seen this practice for years with some coal ashes, most from the subbituminous coal combustion from the Western US.
The biggest energy variable is the process itself.
Not very much. A typical 1GW nuclear power plant uses 300,000 cubic meters of concrete. at 1.5 tonnes per cubic meter and 15% of concrete being cement thats nearly 70000 tons for a nuclear power plant.
When China is consuming over a billion tons a year of cement, I think nuclear powerplants are exhonerated from being copious consumers of cement.
To put the numbers in perspective: by 2030 China plans to install 120-160GW of nuclear capacity.
70,000 tones times 160 equals to 11.2mln.tonnes. In other words the whole nuclear program by 2030 will consume under 1% of the cement China produces for just one year.
We could repower the whole world to 100% nuclear energy with 60% of the cement China produces for just one year. The people who claim this is impossible because "we won't be able to make the concrete, steel, snacks for the workers etc.etc." must be smoking something really strong.
I'm thinking the 3 Gorges Dam probably used a large percentage of this concrete.
No.
For years asphalt was cheaper than concrete for roads and pavement. If concrete can be created with coal in lieu of oil...anyone know why the construction industry hasn't switched to concrete yet? Are the energy inputs that much higher for concrete?
Concrete is out of favor for roads in places where there are temperature extremes. It buckles due to thermal expansion and contraction. Freeze-thaw cycles also cause problems with concrete.
Asphalt pavements (AKA "flexible pavements") hold up much better. Concrete may still be preferred in warm and/or dry areas. I hear a lot of roads in the Middle East are concrete.
Much preferred here in Florida. Lasts longer, lower heat gain, thinner section, not damaged as much by high groundwater tables, flatter slopes, et al.
However after reflection, several of these advantages are unique to Florida and the Gulf Coast and similar areas (flat, hot and high water tables)
Although still, most roads here are asphalt.