Projects
FlexHybHeat: Process development for a hybrid heating concept for highly flexible and low-CO2 billet heating in electric steel mills
BMWK, 1 July 2024 to 30 June 2027
The overall objective of the FlexHybHeat project is to develop a flexible heating concept for steel billet reheating. Despite individual sequence requirements of the rolling mill, the heating concept should be able to achieve hot and direct input rates of 10% and 70% while at the same time allowing individually selectable reheating …
FlexLadleHeat: Flexible use of hydrogen and ammonia in ladle furnaces in the steel industry to reduce CO2 emissions
BMWK, 1 June 2024 to 31 May 2027
The FlexLadleHeat joint project aims to develop an innovative ladle firing system for the flexible use of hydrogen and ammonia to preheat transport ladles in an electric steelwork. The project offers the potential to drastically reduce the CO2 emissions of Badische Stahlwerke’s ladle furnace system through the flexible use of hydrogen- …
HT-Heat: Development of novel resistance heating elements through innovative material and process combinations
IGF, 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2026
The aim of the research project is therefore to develop a new type of heating element that fulfils the process requirement for mechanical stability while at the same time providing sufficient and uniform heat input into the process …
TWINGHY: Digital TWINs for Green HYdrogen transition in steel industry
RFCS, 1 February 2023 to 31 July 2027
In the EU-funded research project TWINGHY — Digital TWINs for Green HYdrogen transition in steel industry — the decarbonization of the reheating process in the steel industry is demonstrated. To this end, two hybrid natural gas-hydrogen burners for combustion with air and oxyfuel are developed and installed in a reheating furnace …
HyInHeat: Hydrogen Technologies for Decarbonization of Industrial Heating Processes
Horizon Europe, 1 January 2023 to 31 December 2026
The consortium around the IOB has set itself the goal of demonstrating the use of hydrogen as fuel in the high-temperature processes of the steel and aluminium industry. Especially in the energy-intensive processes of melting and heat treatment, the replacement of fossil fuels with green hydrogen holds great potential to …
FlexHeat2Anneal: Flexible use of hydrogen in continuous annealing lines and hot-dip coating lines to reduce CO2 emissions in the steel industry
BMWK, 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2025
To enable a switch to hydrogen, existing systems (PP and W heating tubes) will first be examined for the use of hydrogen and natural gas-hydrogen blends within the framework of FlexHeat2Anneal. Subsequently, a fuel-flexible and energy-efficient burner-radiant tube system will be …
HeatSteel: Development of a process model for a strip annealing line
progres.nrw, 1 January 2022 to 31 December 2024
The aim of the HeatSteel project is to develop an innovative and energy-efficient annealing line for thin stainless martensitic precision strips. At the same time, in the course of developing an energy-efficient line, the extent to which process stability can be improved in terms of product quality is to be examined …
COSIMa: CO2-neutral Saint-Gobain industrial site Herzogenrath — feasibility study
progress.nrw, 1 January 2022 to 28 February 2025
The activities planned at the Saint-Gobain site follow two paths that complement each other to form a holistic concept. In addition to the development of a new glass furnace technology (“CO2-neutral glass melting furnace”), an optimised energy efficiency of the overall energy system at the site is …
ZeroCO2Glas: Development of a novel hydrogen-fired glass melting furnace with the aim of a CO2-neutral container glass production
BMWK, 1 January 2022 to 31 December 2026
The overall goal of the ZeroCO2Glas project is to develop a revolutionary glass melting process in connection with a new type of glass melting tank in an all-encompassing approach, with which container glass can be melted in a CO2-neutral manner and with significant energy savings …
Investigation of the influence of flexible operating modes of industrial furnaces on the service life of metallic high-temperature components
AiF, IGF, 1 July 2020 to 31 December 2024
The aim of the research project is to investigate the influence of flexible furnace operation on the service life of metallic high-temperature components. In the course of the project, a mathematical model will be created to describe the creep deformation and material damage of selected materials, which will …
Completed research projects
Development and experimental validation of numerical heat transfer models for impingement jets
IGF, 1 January 2023 to 31 December 2024
The planned project should contribute to the development of a favourable and efficient design option for nozzle systems. For this purpose, an innovative, numerical modelling approach is to be used with which the heat transfer between impact jets and the impact surface can be calculated with sufficient accuracy. At present, …
PbFreePat: Process modelling of wire patenting in lead bath and evaluation of lead-free alternatives
IGF, 1 August 2022 to 31 October 2024
Within the project “PbFreePat”, the heat treatment of steel wire is investigated in depth. Steel wire is used in a variety of different products. Applications range from ropes or rope cores, tyre cord in tyres or pre-products for the manufacturing of screws, pins and springs. During the production of …
Heat transfer at surface contacts in preheating and heat treatment processes
(“Surface Contacts II”)
IGF, 1 July 2021 to 31 December 2023
In the current project, an existing test rig is further developed for investigating the temperature range relevant to thermo-processing at low contact stresses. The test rig will be used to measure the thermal resistance between surface contacts. During the measurements, the temperature, …
TTgoesH2: IGF lead technology
7th Energy Research Programme / IGF, 1 January 2021 to 31 December 2023
As part of the energy transition in Germany, efforts are being made to introduce more hydrogen generated from renewable sources into the gas transport networks. With an increased hydrogen content, the gas properties change. This poses particular challenges for the thermoprocessing industry …
FLOX‑2®: Multi-stage flameless oxidation as a contribution to the generation of CO2-neutral process heat
BMWK, 1 May 2020 to 31 December 2023
Multi-stage flameless oxidation is considered an extension of flameless oxidation. Furthermore, this type of combustion is also available in processes with combustion chamber temperatures below the auto-ignition temperature. Thus, heating up in flame mode is no longer required and …
REVaMP: Retrofitting Equipment for Efficient Use of Variable Feedstock in Metal Making Processes
Horizon 2020, EU SPIRE, 1 January 2020 to 31 December 2023
The main objective of the REVaMP project is to develop, adapt and apply novel retrofitting technologies to cope with the increasing variability and to ensure an efficient use of the feedstock in terms of materials and energy. This will be exemplarily demonstrated within three different use cases …
Coupled Process Chain Modeling
IGF, 1 June 2021 to 30 November 2023
In the project, the semantic interoperability of mathematical process models between individual steps of the process chain is to be improved. To this end, model extensions and a platform for data management as well as for the uniform execution of the models will be developed and validated in …
Improvement of heat transfer in tube-bundle heat exchangers by using structured tubes
ZIM, 20 October 2020 to 30 September 2023
The aim of the research project is to improve the energy efficiency and economy of gas-fired industrial furnace systems with central air preheating. This goal is to be achieved by increasing the surface area and improving the heat transfer of the individual tube bundles in a central recuperator …
Spray nozzle fields in cooling sections: Defined setup of heat transfer profiles in spray nozzle fields for optimization of heat treatment in continuous strip plants
IGF, 1 August 2019 to 31 July 2023
The flow phenomena and their influence on the heat transfer are investigated in the project “Spray nozzle fields in cooling sections” in order to adjust the heat transfer on the surface in a defined way afterwards. The flow phenomena are determined at the Department for Industrial Furnace …
CO2-neutral process heat generation
Study commissioned by the Federal Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt),
1 June 2019 til end of May 2023
The objectives of the project are to determine the current state of the art and the need for further action in the area of research and development for the use of CO2-neutral process heating systems for the respective industries and areas of application. A further objective is to estimate the economic viability of …
Increasing the thermomechanical stability of tangential fans for the use in thermoprocessing plants
IGF, 1 August 2019 to 30 April 2023
The aim of this project is to design a thermomechanically stable tangential fan for use in thermoprocessing plants. For this purpose, numerical investigations are carried out to increase the thermomechanical stability using the finite element method and the influence on the fluid mechanical properties …