Carbon2Chem®

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Information about the Joint Project

The Carbon2Chem® project is sponsored by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) as part of its 6th Energy Research Program.

Its aim to reduce the amont of CO2 emissions produced by unavoidable CO2-producing processes in steelworks, waste incineration plants and lime works by using the CCU approach (carbon capture and utilization) the ensure that unavoidable CO2 is fed back into the production cycle.

This reduces the use of new fossil fuels and raw materials and, at the same time, provides the industry with an additional source of carbon-based raw materials.

The consortium comprises 18 partners who are currently working together in 7 joint projects.

Overall, the project has been designed to take place in three funding phases over a period of ten years. The end of the project will see large-scale technical implementation of the results obtained.

The focus of the first phase is basic research.

The main emphasis of the second, current phase (2020–2024) is on application-oriented research, while the last project phase concentrates on the industrial realization of the project results.

The development of a cross-industry production network for reducing CO2 emissions from steelworks and tapping new sources of raw materials for the chemical industry has been successful. This enables a significant reduction of emissions in steelworks and makes a substantial contribution to the defossilization of the chemicals industry.

Presently, in addition to the large-scale technical implementation, project members are working on the transferral of the outcomes to other domains.

Subprojects at the FernUniversität in the Department of Environmental Sciences

  • On this basis, the Department of Environmental Sciences is investigating which regulatory framework conditions are required to ensure that the technical options can be implemented. To this end, the relevant regulations are first analyzed and evaluated with regard to their significance for the application described.
    This is done by carrying out the following tasks:

    • Setting up a matrix of the relevant action areas/topics and regulations
    • Identification of disadvantages for cross-industry production networks
    • Identification of gaps in the regulations
    • Identification and summarizing action areas to ensure that the desired solution can succeed
  • Based on the current state of the regulatory framework for cross-industry networks, as identified in the project, a concept for the adaptation of the framework will be developed with the following tasks:

    • Grouping of the action areas according to factors such as impact and sustainability
    • Drafting of action options for the government and business
    • Classification of the results to facilitate their implementation in the global economic system
    • Summarization and prioritization of the results
  • To ensure that the results of the project can be disseminated sustainably and long-term knowledge transfer can take place, further training measures will be very useful. This provides the opportunity for existing and new academic staff to access the necessary interdisciplinary knowledge beyond the content of the relevant disciplines and to anchor it in practice. To this end, a blended learning training program is being developed for distance teaching that will provide academics from the areas of management, planning, construction and operation of cross-industry production systems with essential know-how, thus enabling them to plan, expand and operate such systems. This will be achieved via the following tasks:

    • Target group analyses, requirements analyses
    • Drawing up a didactic concept for the blended learning program, including a module handbook
    • Setting up a “Basics” learning module on the technological constraints and interfaces
    • Test phase
  • Building on the “Basics” module, further measures are being developed to cover specific requirements in a more targeted fashion. This will happen in the following steps:

    • Extension of the didactic concept and the module manual
    • Setting up a learning module “Regulatory Frameworks”
    • Setting up a learning module “Planning, Construction, and Operation of Cross-Industry Systems”
    • Test phase

Head of Project

Prof. Dr. Görge Deerberg Fraunhofer-UMSICHT/Mike Henning

Prof. Dr. Görge Deerberg

Phone: +49 2331 987-4815

Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

Department of Environmental Sciences

Nicholas Quaintmere | 10.05.2024