"Industrial processes": Synchronized and energy-adaptive production technology for the flexible alignment of industrial processes to a fluctuating energy supply (SynErgie)

 

Motivation

Due to the ever-increasing share of fluctuating power generators, an efficient balance between energy supply and demand is required. In the future, a balanced technology mix between renewable energies, flexible conventional power plants, storage facilities, grid expansion and flexible users will be needed to guarantee security of supply. Many of these solution modules are associated with high costs, which are passed on to the user, and entail social acceptance problems. With a total of 44 percent of the net electricity demand and 25 percent of the heat demand in Germany, industrial processes and in particular large individual plants in energy-intensive industrial sectors have considerable levers for flexibility. Demand side management (DSM), the medium- and short-term flexibilisation of electricity demand, offers an opportunity to enable the conversion of the energy system in a cost-efficient and socially acceptable manner.

Objective

SynErgie supports the cost-efficient implementation of the energy system transformation on the basis of renewable energies and thus enables Germany to develop into an international leading supplier for flexible industrial processes. In SynErgie, the Production Management Department of WZL at RWTH Aachen University is developing an optimization model for energy-flexible production planning and control. This optimization model is illustrated by means of a software demonstrator and implemented and validated in the production environment of the Aachen demonstration factory. The aim is to make the energy demand of manufacturing companies more flexible, taking into account overriding goals such as adherence to schedules. This is intended to improve the DSM and thus contribute to the success of the energy turnaround.