"Digital technologies can contribute to sustainable development, among other things via resource-efficient production or networked mobility. Conversely, it is important to make digitization sustainable," explains KIT President Professor Holger Hanselka in the run-up to HANNOVER MESSE 2022. "Thanks to its interdisciplinary research, KIT is ideally positioned to meet these challenges, particularly in the fields of information, energy, mobility, climate, materials, and people and technology. How relevant the work on renewable energies, their storage, and distribution is, for example, is currently shown by the effects of the war in Ukraine." At Hannover Messe 2022, KIT will therefore present several highlights from research and innovation in the "Energy Solutions" area, including the CarbonCycleLab, the NECOC project, and the planned spin-off ICODOS.

In the CarbonCycleLab, several KIT institutes link the complete process chain of the carbon cycle of the future: from residual and waste materials to chemical base materials obtained from them for reuse in the chemical industry as a substitute for fossil raw materials. In this way, the CarbonCycleLab is intended to help bring together the energy transition with a circular economy in order to achieve a resource-efficient, climate-neutral and competitive economy in the future. The booth features a model of an entrained-flow gasifier suitable for various applications, explained through an interactive table.

In the NECOC project, researchers are extracting carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and using an innovative process to produce carbon black, a high-tech feedstock. The solid carbon, which is produced in the process in the form of microgranular powder, is separated and is then to be commercially exploited as a high-priced educt, for example in the rubber, construction or electrical industries.

Finally, the planned spin-off ICODOS will produce green methanol thanks to an innovative power-to-X technology. In implementing the technology, ICODOS will initially focus on biogas, but plans to make it available for other CO2 point sources, such as the cement industry. A pilot plant is currently under construction and will be integrated into the Energy Lab 2.0 at KIT.

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