Dortmund-based heating technology specialist GoGaS Goch GmbH & Co. KG has developed a hydrogen burner that makes extremely clean combustion possible by utilising porous combustion technology. This takes place in a porous ceramic foam, with each pore in the foam representing a separate reaction cell.
Apart from water, only trace amounts of nitrogen oxides are produced as a combustion product. Compared to a natural gas burner, the hydrogen burner has a heat transfer coefficient that is more than twice as high, which means that the heating process only takes half as long.
This technology is already suitable for making steelworks largely CO2-neutral. However, it is not only heating or forming processes in the steel sector that can be realised in a sustainable and climate-friendly way.
Technology for fuel independence technology
In another ZIM research project together with the KIT (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology), work is being carried out on a switchable burner that can work with both natural gas and hydrogen. This new technology makes the burner independent of the fuel on offer.
This new burner technology is also the focus of the EU research project ECCO. Here, the coil coating process is being made significantly more sustainable. The coil coating process is used in a large part of industrial steel and metal alloy production and is associated with large plants and high primary energy consumption.
As part of the ECCO project, the energy requirement will be reduced by around 80 per cent, CO2 emissions by around 65 per cent and the space requirement of the new technology by 50 per cent. In 2021, a demonstration plant will go into operation on a production scale in Italy at the project partner for rolling mill technology Globus SRL.
The aim here is to test the new process on a production scale and prove that there is no loss of quality compared to today's recognised processes. The new process should thus become "acceptable" and recognised.
Text excerpt ProduktionNRW / VDMA e.V.
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