Thomas Bagus, Dr. Stefan Glos, Nevzat Oezcan (Siemens Energy), Dr. Regina Hill (Currenta), Prof. Dr.-Ing. Roland Span, Prof. Dr. Valentin Bertsch (Ruhr University of Bochum) and Dr. Rüdiger Franck (Currenta) at the start of the joint project in Mülheim for the “CO2neichem” spin project (Image: Siemens Energy)
The project is funded by the Ministry of Economy, Innovation, Digitization and Energy of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia as part of the funding of the Leading-Edge Cluster for industrial innovations. Project partners of the “CO2Neichem” project include Siemens Energy and Currenta also the Ruhr University of Bochum. The loan has a volume of one million euros.
The theme of the SPIN project is the development of CO technologies2– Neutral, economical, efficient and reliable energy supply of heat-intensive industrial sites on the example of a chemical park. The energy consumption of industry in Germany amounts to around 700 terawatt hours (TWh) per year. About 70% of this is process heat, needed as process steam at temperatures between 160 and 500 ° C. In Germany, only around 5% of this process heat currently comes from renewable energies. The energy transition therefore requires a transformation of the process heat supply.
Heat pump and hydrogen gas turbine
The spin consortium has pre-selected two technological concepts that appear to be the most suitable for the climate-neutral and cost-effective generation of large amounts of process steam. It is a steam gas turbine driven with hydrogen and oxygen and a high temperature industrial heat pump with heat and cold extraction. As part of the funding project, a conceptual study and an analysis of the energy system are carried out first. A detailed concept for a demonstration application of the favored system should therefore be worked out before the pilot project is finally implemented.
“The decarbonisation of heat generation for industry is a key element for a successful energy transition. We can only succeed in this if we study, develop and test the appropriate technologies today. We are grateful that our project is supported by the Ministry of Energy of North Rhine-Westphalia and look forward to implementing it together with our project partners, “says Nevzat Oezcan, head of the Mülheim branch of Siemens Energy.
On behalf of the Ministry of Innovation, Minister Prof. Dr. Andreas Pinkwart: “The chemical industry has a huge need for energy and heat. In order to be able to cover all of this in a safe and climate-friendly way in the future and to keep our industrial companies competitive, we now need new supply concepts quickly. I am therefore very pleased that we can now support another project that contributes to the climate-neutral conversion of our strong industrial position. “
“The project fits perfectly with Currenta’s sustainability goals and we are very pleased with the funding from the state of North Rhine-Westphalia,” explains Dr. Regina Hill, Head of Marketing Supply and Waste Management. “In particular, heat pumps and the use of green hydrogen play an important role in our strategy as key technologies,” continued Hill. Under “CO2neichem”, Currenta will work with project partners to promote the further development of these technologies in order to secure the production capacity of the chemical industry. “For us as chemical park operators, it is crucial to create sustainable, reliable and cost-effective production conditions,” Hill points out.
