Chemical industry

The chemical industry, including the petrochemical industry, supplies essential starting products for other branches of industries, e.g. for the plastics industry, the automotive and engineering industry, the construction and building materials industries, and for the food industries. Among the starting products are organic and inorganic precursors and chemicals, fertilisers, herbicides and pesticides, plastics, pharmaceuticals and a broad range of additional products.

Energy-intensive production processes (e.g. steam reforming, steam cracking, chloralkali process) and the high share of fossil raw materials (primarily crude oil and natural gas) render the chemical industry largely responsible for a considerable share of the overall anthropogenic environmental impacts.

ifeu prepares detailed analyses of environmental impacts of production processes of the (petro-) chemical industries, including either all relevant subsequent processing and life stages of products (cradle-to-grave approach), or with a special focus on the processing chain (cradle-to-gate, see eco-profiles). Our approaches are based on many years of experience with the topic, long-standing cooperation links with industry partners and detailed mathematical modelling of processes (e.g. crude oil and natural extraction, refinery model).

Projects

H2-Companion - Supportive research for the model region “Green Hydrogen Baden-Württemberg”

What are the potentials impacts of the hydrogen technology on Baden-Württemberg as an economic location? What changes can be expected for the value chains, and what ecological advantages, consequences…

Industrieanlage: Chemiewerk bei Nacht

Process-integrated measures and alternative production methods for an environmentally friendly production of chemicals

Which processes and measures are necessary to produce chemicals in an environmentally friendly way in the future? In this project, established methods are considered as well as the current state of…

VAMOS

Value added materials from organic waste sugars

Sugar is one of the most essential raw materials for industrial bioprocessing supply chains. The VAMOS project aims to demonstrate the commercial feasibility of producing sugar derived from household…

SinFonia

The SinFonia project tries to produce organic fluorine compounds by biosynthesis. This could replace the previous environmentally harmful chemical methods used to produce the substances.

System Comparison of Storable Renewable Energy Sources (SYSEET)

To decarbonize the economy by 2050 synthetic energy carriers based on renewable sources are needed. The SYSEET project investigates the environmental impacts of providing these so-called power-to-X…

CO2 in der Luft

CORAL

The research team on the “CORAL” project uses modern process engineering to extract carbon dioxide from the air and make it available as a raw material. This is a challenging project as the…

Rückenansicht eines Mannes vor einem Screen, auf dem Icons die Reduktion von CO2-Emissionen für die Sektoren Energie, Industrie und Verkehr darstellen.

Kopernikus-Project P2X

"Power-to-X" refers to technologies that convert electricity from renewable sources into material energy storage, energy carriers and energy-intensive chemical products. More about the project...

Screening Life Cycle Assessment of Transformers with different Dielectric Fluids

ifeu accompanied a pilot project of Netze BW, in which the use of bio-oils as insulating medium in transformers was investigated.

Eco-profile of polyolefins (HDPE and PP) in the GCC

The aim of the project was to create Eco-profiles for HDPE and PP produced within countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), in analogy to the Eco-profiles published by PlasticsEurope relating…

Oil and gas production model

The oil and gas production model presents a powerful and versatile tool for the assessment of environmental impacts arising from oil and gas production including transport in different global regions…

Refinery and petrochemical industry modelling

Material and energy flows within a single refinery or an entire refinery region may be analysed with the complex and flexible ifeu refinery model. It may also be used for the characterisation of…