The French word mâchefer (clinker) first appeared around the 16th century to name a product of general combustion. In the past, it referred above all to artisanal and industrial waste, while today’s clinker comes mainly from the incineration of urban waste. Various scholarly corpuses have been produced about this product due both to scientific investigation and the different ways of using it, mainly as a waste product or recyclable material. The present paper offers an analysis of the content and form of the technoscientific writings on this product. The aim is to bring out the main points of this production of technoscientific information. This literature can help us to understand the controversies involving the recycling of clinker as well as its utility, clinker seen as both a problem and a solution.