HyInHeat: Hydrogen Technologies for Decarbonization of Industrial Heating Processes

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 decrease CO₂ emis­si­ons of indus­tri­al pro­ces­ses. In order to take account of the fact that lar­ge quan­ti­ties of green hydro­gen are not yet wide­ly available, the ope­ra­ti­on in a fuel mix of natu­ral gas and hydro­gen up to pure hydro­gen is being inves­ti­ga­ted. Ano­ther focus is on com­bus­ti­on with pure oxy­gen, which is a secon­da­ry pro­duct of green hydro­gen pro­duc­tion via elec­tro­ly­sis and enables an increase in com­bus­ti­on efficiency.

The pro­ject is loca­ted in the Tech­no­lo­gy Rea­di­ness Level (TRL) 3 to 7 and thus incor­po­ra­tes the deve­lo­p­ment stages from expe­ri­men­tal tech­no­lo­gy deve­lo­p­ment to pro­to­ty­pes in an indus­tri­al envi­ron­ment. Within this frame­work, eight fur­naces will be con­ver­ted on a pilot and indus­tri­al sca­le and the respec­ti­ve pro­ces­ses will be inves­ti­ga­ted in detail. The pro­ject, which is part of the Hori­zon Euro­pe fun­ding pro­gram­me, runs under the umbrel­la of the Processes4Planet Part­ner­ship. The cor­re­spon­ding EU-fun­ding is 17.7 mil­li­on euros, the total cost of the pro­ject is almost 24 mil­li­on euros.

Con­sor­ti­um of the rese­arch project

Among the part­ners from 12 Euro­pean count­ries the­re are steel pro­du­cers Arce­lor­Mit­tal, Cel­sa Group and SSAB, as well as three steel pro­du­cers, and Befe­sa, Con­stel­li­um, Myti­li­ne­os and Spei­ra from the alu­mi­ni­um sec­tor. The auto­mo­ti­ve indus­try is repre­sen­ted by Toyo­ta. Lin­de and Nip­pon Gases act as gas sup­pli­ers and tech­no­lo­gy pro­vi­ders, and fur­nace manu­fac­tu­r­ers Danie­li, GHI Hor­nos and Sar­ral­le con­tri­bu­te with their tech­ni­cal exper­ti­se. Indus­tri­al com­pe­tence in the refrac­to­ry sec­tor is repre­sen­ted by RHI Magen­si­ta and Mor­gan Advan­ced Mate­ri­als, and in the field of mea­su­re­ment tech­no­lo­gy SICK and Lux­met sup­port the pro­ject part­ners with their know-how. The Euro­pean asso­cia­ti­ons ESTEP and Euro­pean Alu­mi­ni­um con­tri­bu­te with the coll­ec­tion and pro­vi­si­on of data for sce­na­rio ana­ly­ses and help with the dis­se­mi­na­ti­on of the results. As an expert in Euro­pean pro­jects, EGEN and its online mar­ke­ting part­ner Cloud­sel­ling will also pro­vi­de signi­fi­cant sup­port to the con­sor­ti­um in publi­shing the results.

With Tecna­lia, Ceit, SWERIM and the Bar­ce­lo­na Super­com­pu­ting Cen­ter, four rese­arch insti­tu­ti­ons are repre­sen­ted. From aca­de­mia, in addi­ti­on to the Uni­ver­si­ty of Oulu, the Nor­we­gi­an NTNU and the Poli­tec­ni­co de Mila­no, three depart­ments of RWTH Aachen Uni­ver­si­ty con­tri­bu­te to the pro­ject: The Insti­tu­te of Mine­ral Engi­nee­ring (GHI) is dedi­ca­ted to refrac­to­ry fur­nace mate­ri­als. Samples from the indus­tri­al plants as well as new­ly deve­lo­ped mate­ri­als are exami­ned for their inter­ac­tion with the new fur­nace atmo­sphe­res, which chan­ge in terms of tem­pe­ra­tures and com­po­si­ti­on com­pared to com­bus­ti­on with natu­ral gas. Fol­lo­wing a series of expe­ri­ments in the institute’s own sphe­ri­cal com­bus­ti­on cham­ber, the Insti­tu­te for Com­bus­ti­on Tech­no­lo­gy (ITV) pro­vi­des the kine­tic reac­tion mecha­nism for hydro­gen com­bus­ti­on, which maps the com­bus­ti­on reac­tions in sub­se­quent CFD simu­la­ti­ons. Tog­e­ther with the Bar­ce­lo­na Super­com­pu­ting Cen­ter, a metho­do­lo­gy for lar­ge-eddy simu­la­ti­on (LES) of hydro­gen com­bus­ti­on is being deve­lo­ped, by means of which the fla­me dyna­mics can be pre­dic­ted under given ope­ra­ting conditions.

HyIn­Heat con­sor­ti­um at the kick-off mee­ting (Janu­ary 2023)

IOB project tasks

In addi­ti­on to the pro­ject coor­di­na­ti­on, IOB con­tri­bu­tes to the spe­ci­fic work packa­ges of the pro­ject. For exam­p­le, the influence of impu­ri­ties in the fuel on the instru­men­ta­ti­on of the gas sup­p­ly and the bur­ner ope­ra­ti­on is being tes­ted in the in-house tech­ni­cal cent­re. The alte­red con­di­ti­ons in the flue gas due to the increased water con­tent are ana­ly­sed regar­ding the neces­sa­ry adjus­t­ments in the field of emis­si­on mea­su­re­ment tech­no­lo­gy. The con­ven­tio­nal mea­su­re­ment of nitro­gen oxi­de emis­si­ons in dry exhaust gas must be cri­ti­cal­ly ques­tio­ned in this con­text, so that alter­na­ti­ve mea­su­re­ment prin­ci­ples are evaluated.

In the area of model­ling and simu­la­ti­on, the acti­vi­ties focus on the model­ling of sin­gle bur­ners as well as enti­re fur­naces, inclu­ding the pro­ducts and peri­phe­ral plant com­pon­ents. In addi­ti­on to direct hea­ting in mel­ting fur­naces for the alu­mi­ni­um indus­try and hea­ting fur­naces for hot forming of steel, indi­rect hea­ting with radi­ant tubes is also being inves­ti­ga­ted. Due to the increased water con­tent in the exhaust gas, the emis­si­vi­ty chan­ges com­pared to natu­ral gas com­bus­ti­on, so that sui­ta­ble models for ther­mal radia­ti­on are being eva­lua­ted. A reasonable nume­ri­cal effort is achie­ved by Rey­nolds Aver­a­ged Navi­er Sto­kes (RANS) simu­la­ti­ons, which are sol­ved on the part­ly new­ly crea­ted ser­ver capa­ci­ties at the IOB. The metho­do­lo­gy is vali­da­ted against accu­ra­te LES simu­la­ti­on results and data from the labo­ra­to­ries and indus­try demons­tra­tors. The simu­la­ti­ons sup­port the design of bur­ners, fur­nace pro­ces­ses and the con­ver­si­on of exis­ting plants to ope­ra­te on hydro­gen. In par­al­lel, the mate­ri­al flow ana­ly­sis and life cycle assess­ments of the pro­ces­ses and pro­ducts are con­ti­nuous­ly eva­lua­ted to ensu­re the achie­ve­ment of the over­all pro­ject goal: To make a major con­tri­bu­ti­on to the decar­bo­ni­sa­ti­on of the steel and alu­mi­ni­um industry.