Next to water, it’s said that concrete is the most-used material on Earth. To put this intro perspective, it’s said that the planet places a New York City amount of concrete each year. (Anything to not use the metric system.) Now consider the cost of damage from urban flooding. Even with the stormwater infrastructure of our cities and towns, the concrete placed forms a solid causeway for water.
Interestingly enough, New York City allocated $32 million for porous pavement across seven miles of road in Brooklyn with the intent to divert millions of gallons of stormwater, reducing flooding and sewage overflows.
The idea behind a pervious concrete to control excess water has been around for a long time. Where both a porous and a pervious concrete mix would allow water to flow through, pore size is the key difference.
In a way, while all porous concrete is permeable, not all pervious concrete is porous. These terms are used interchangeably — and for all intents and purposes can likely continue to be. Despite that, you can find a distinction.
An Achilles heel for pervious concrete, Greg Johnson, founder and CEO of AquiPor Technologies, explains that over time contaminants and particulates of stormwater can clog the voids within pervious concrete. His goal was to address this by manufacturing a developing a porous concrete technology to provide a mix with a pore dimension / matrix small enough that it filters sediment and particulates at the surface, and can be maintained with a vacuum, sweep or power wash that allows the concrete to return to full permeability.
Through advanced technology, AquiPor Technologies manufactures a product with the consistency of a fine sand or powder (think to a 325 minus mesh) where you can blend into a “normal” concrete mix to achieve the porosity and water permeable characteristics at the molecular level. As of May 2026, the company is seeking commercial pilot projects and actively fundraising for a larger production facility.
Chemically, he says that their material also affects the hydration and the curing process, noting that they’ve seen high late strengths in some mixes as well as some Pozzolanic activity.
“We're at the point now where we're trying to make enough of our [product] to be able to facilitate some of the pilot projects and the conversations that we're in with agencies,” says Johnson. He says they have pilot opportunities in Milwaukee, Spokane, and Los Angeles. The company manufacturers its material for dry-cast paver products, precast concrete, and can implement the material into a pour-in-place mix for use in volumetric mixing trucks or ready-mix batch plants.
Even though you’re not veering much away from pouring a traditional concrete, crew training is essential.
The idea has been around for decades; Johnson explains that pervious concrete is mainly associated as a concrete mix with a coarse aggregate without fine sand. Large voids formed in the concrete allow water to mechanically flow through. He sees “porous” as a broader descriptor of a concrete featuring a fundamentally different porous structure throughout the material. As he explains, these pores are orders of magnitude smaller.
Sub-Base
Any water flowing through a pervious concrete needs to go somewhere, so sub-grade preparation requires a reservoir of sorts. A standard (non-porous) concrete placement is designed for structural load transfer, but a porous material has a dual mandate of structural and hydraulic performance.
It’s important to not over-compact the sub-grade and aggregate base, both need to be permeable. However, soil hydrology will be a factor. A heavy clay soil may need an under-drain system, whereas a more permeable soil be more loosely compacted with a coarse sand. You need a reservoir to take on that water and size the sub-base and excavation based on the natural soil hydrology of your site.
Finishing is Very Different
In interactions with contractors, Johnson says many don’t like working with pervious concrete. Batching and placing have narrow tolerances. If the water ratio is off or the conditions outside aren’t “just right” can greatly affect a pervious concrete pour.
Even though you’re not veering much away from pouring a traditional concrete, crew training is essential. As an example, “Finish is very different with pervious concrete,” he says. “You have almost no finishing in the traditional sense.”
Consider the use of a pervious/porous concrete placement and a stormwater infrastructure as a partnership, not replacement.
You don’t want to use a bull float. You don’t want to trowel it. Apparently, the surface texture is essentially set by the mix; overworking the mix risks closing the surface pores, making an impermeable layer of concrete mix on the surface. AquiPor recommends an etch of some sort after placement, be it mechanical or an inhibitor the goal is to remove the cream layer to facilitate porosity. It goes without saying, but it’s still worth noting — it’s not recommended to seal or coat a pervious concrete.
On top of the narrow tolerances and finishing differences, pervious concrete can be 10 to 25 percent more cost than a traditional concrete mix. (In some cases, it can be two or three times the cost.)
The crux of the situation, says Johnson, is to look at the total infrastructure cost. “If implementing our technology in 10 miles of roadway, for example, is going to lessen the amount of gray infrastructure you need underneath it - storm drains, piping conveyance, then it becomes very economic,” he says.
However, this can’t be considered across-the-board as each project will need to be modeled out. At pure material cost, their product may be competitive with traditional pervious but expect both to be more expensive than a conventional concrete mix.
Relieving Stormwater Systems
Consider the use of a pervious/porous concrete placement and a stormwater infrastructure as a partnership, not replacement. Acting like a pressure relief valve, “The way I look at is, we ease the burden on those systems,” says Johnson.
Every gallon of stormwater that can be intercepted with concrete before it reaches the inlet, can slow and potentially lower the volume to reduce peak flows. Many U.S. cities are built on combined sewer systems to manage stormwater, wastewater and raw sewage. If overwhelmed, these systems may be engineered to discharge into the nearest water body. The idea of adding a pervious or porous concrete placement to help mitigate flooding and release the burden on the downstream system, the better.
“The market is here now. I feel like we’re seeing a lot of regulatory tailwinds from federal to the municipal level,” he adds. “The market is ready for this. Cities need to figure out how to manage stormwater right on site and we think — whether it’s pervious concrete or our material, we think conceptually that’s the way to do it.”
