Today was a fascinating day of site visits. Our first stop was Vassiliko cement works where we discussed the making of cement as well as the production of the intermediate product, clinker. The overall process is rather lengthy and has high energy demands meaning the reduction of this energy use is a priority for improving environmental sustainability. For Vassiliko, this largely looks like modifying the kiln usage in terms of the fuel and optimization of the kiln. Given they can import large cubes of trash from Italy and the UK for free (free because these countries are interested in eliminating the presence of excess trash and will hand it over), Vassiliko opts to burn this to power the kilns, eliminating 60-70% of the typical fuel usage that causes high CO2 emissions. Outside of this, they are also constantly making efforts to optimize the kiln to reduce the stress on the system and therefore lower the power consumption. Another way they implement sustainable practices is in their formula for the cement as they aim to develop formulas that retain the same strength as their current formula while requiring less clinker. In turn, since limestone calcification is a requirement for clinker production and is where notable CO2 emissions stem from, lowering clinker production will lessen the plant’s emissions. Their location offers a final way they inherently have a more sustainable business as the close proximity of the quarries, plant, and port limit the need for transportation to join the separate steps and therefore emissions from transportation methods are lessened.

We learned less of the environmental sustainability of the Vassiliko Port and VTTV operations; however, the information they shared develops a case for their commitment to human and economic sustainability. Vassiliko offers local customers the opportunity to ship things like scrap metal in the leftover space on ships when they fill them with clinker, and this displays their economic efficiency as well as their friendly connection with Cypriot businesses and citizens. They work to keep their system and management up to date so that they can offer the rest of the world an optimized and advanced product that is underappreciated given how much cement is used.

VTTV’s entire premise also revolves around providing humans and businesses with very necessary products and does so by holding an intermediate position in the supply of liquid fuels so that the customers are protected in times of need and have a reliable source of gas, kerosene, jet fuel, diesel, and more. While we were there, they were doing maintenance on a tank while it was still being used, and from this they exemplify their economic sustainability and loyalty to those using the

service they offer.

Our final and, in my opinion, most interesting visit so far was to the Cyprus Marine & Maritime Institute. There we heard about numerous of the projects they are currently working on, and as the goal central to the Institute is sustainability, every project proved to support the sustainability of the island’s marine lands as well as the rest of the worlds. The projects varied from marine data collection to reducing emissions of current and future ships to the automation of devices that can aid in marine problems. I was particularly interested in their development of a fleet of robots that aims to evaluate information about a ship and predict and direct the future movements of said ship. The fleet of robots has drones that scan the scenario from above as well as underwater robots that are equipped with varying types of sensors. All of the data that is collected is then applied in real time to determine the current location of the ship and optimize its future choices. This can aid in port congestion as well as making smarter decisions in a variety of ways.