Raw material stories
Limestone has been extracted and processed since antiquity. In Germany, lime as a building material was introduced by the Romans approximately 2.000 years ago. The high standard of lime burning techniques has survived until today and provides for the high quality of this traditional building material.
Traditional lime burning
The limestones to be burned are carefully stacked up over the fireplace.
The firing takes place via a stokehole and takes at last 100 hours. Traditionally, wood, turf or coal were used as fuels. Carbon dioxide is released in the process which produces calcium oxide.
The lime used in AURO's Ecolith interior and exterior lime paints is produced following traditional production techniques. This particularly pure fresh water lime comes from a private quarry near Sevilla.
The limestone is burnt traditionally in an earth oven for more than a week at 1.000 °C using olive wood and kernels as fuel. This complex manufacturing method is fundamentally different from the ways building lime is made by industrial lime producers.
Sources: Excerpts from seilnacht.com, wikipedia.de and Graphenstone
