Living labs of the energy transition
As an important pillar of energy research, the Living labs of the energy transition of the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK) address key challenges on an industrial scale.
In the 7th Energy Research Programme, the Federal Government established the living labs of the energy transition as a new BMWK funding format. The format will be continued in the BMWK's 8th Energy Research Programme for Applied Energy Research published in October 2023. They make it possible to test innovative technologies in practical applications under real conditions and on an industrial scale. The living labs of the energy transition look at the systemic interaction of energy supply and energy demand at the level of, for example, a specific neighbourhood, one or more selected cities, or they even extend across several federal states.
The experience gained in the projects can then be used by experts to decisively advance the far-reaching transformation of the energy system in Germany towards climate neutrality. Living labs are a valuable practical test for innovations on the way to implementation in the energy industry and therefore provide important support for the success of the energy transition.
Funding of the living labs of the energy transition
The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action is closing the technological development gap for innovations between application-orientated research and broad implementation in practice with the living labs of the energy transition funding format. The concept is aimed in particular at the energy sector, energy-intensive industry and the housing sector. It is open to all technologies.
So far, 15 living labs of the energy transition have started their work. Since April 2021, the Trans4ReaL transfer research project has also been providing scientific support to the living labs of the energy transition with a focus on sector coupling and hydrogen technologies. The knowledge gained in the project will then be incorporated into a hydrogen roadmap of the German government as options for action.
The ongoing living labs of the energy transition at a glance
Living labs of the energy transition on energy optimised districts
Project insight with additional information
Project website: www.delta-darmstadt.de
Duration: 2021 to 2026
Funding: co-financed by the EU as part of the German Recovery and Resilience Plan (DARP)
Consortium leader: Technical University of Darmstadt with industrial partners
State: Hesse
Focus: Energy flows in large cities
Project: Showcase for the urban energy transition through interacting energy-optimised districts
Summary: In the future energy supply system, urban neighbourhoods must function in an energy-optimised way. And: they must interact with each other so that the energy demand within a city as a whole can be reduced as far as possible and energy can be used efficiently.
In Darmstadt, several types of neighbourhood - from industry to commerce and education to housing - are to be linked with network infrastructures in the areas of electricity, heat, gas, communication and transport. The DELTA partners will then analyse and optimise the corresponding interaction. The aim is to better utilise and link the grids, creating cross-sector synergies. The overarching goal is to reduce energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions in urban districts. Economic feasibility and social acceptance are also being analysed. Last but not least, DELTA aims to simplify the planning of future energy supply, reduce infrastructure costs and minimise the construction of new capacities.
Topic: Energy-optimised districts
Project insight with additional information
Duration: 2023 to 2027
Consortium leader: BTB - Blockheizkraftwerks-, Träger- und Betreibergesellschaft mbH Berlin
State: Berlin
Focus: Large city
Project: High-temperature aquifer heat storage with heat pump system for the decarbonisation of district heating networks
Summary: The efficient combination of geothermal, seasonal heat storage with renewable combined heat, power and cooling can increase the proportion of CO2-free urban heat supply to a relevant extent. Berlin is representative of the geological conditions of the North German Basin. Here, a high-temperature aquifer storage facility is to be built at the site of the Berlin-Adlershof combined heat and power plant and its integration into an existing district heating network is to be trialled using an innovative heat pump concept and coupling to a cooling network.
In contrast to previous aquifer storage projects, this real-life laboratory for the energy transition will involve high-temperature storage at up to 95 degrees Celsius in the 400 metre-deep aquifer. In combination with a large heat pump, the team aims to optimise storage operation, reduce operating losses and increase storage capacity. A withdrawal capacity of ten megawatts and a storage capacity of more than 30 gigawatt hours are expected. Optimised storage operation can be a key component of a 100 per cent climate-neutral heating and cooling supply in the district.
Topic: Energy-optimised districts
Project insights with additional information
Project website: www.agfw.de/reallabor-gwp
Duration: 2021 to 2026
Funding: co-financed by the EU as part of the German Recovery and Resilience Plan (DARP)
Consortium leader: AGFW-Projekt GmbH - a company of AGFW | The Energy Efficiency Association for Heating, Cooling and CHP e. V.
State: Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria and Berlin
Focus: Medium-sized city, large city
Project: Showcase for the urban energy transition through interacting energy-optimised neighbourhoods
Summary: A large proportion of energy consumption and CO2 emissions in Germany are attributable to heat supply. For this reason, the use of large heat pumps (GWP) in particular offers great potential for reducing greenhouse gases. In order to develop innovative concepts here, regulatory barriers must be removed.
The GWP real-world laboratory therefore aims to test economic and regulatory framework conditions as well as efficient operating concepts for the use of large heat pumps. The consortium also wants to find out how large heat pumps can be used for the overarching transformation of the heating and electricity infrastructure and thus make a significant contribution to sector coupling. To this end, five large heat pumps with different integration concepts, heat sources and other specifics are to be integrated into the district heating networks in Germany. The sites are independent in their own right, but are linked via an overarching central data collection, analysis and optimisation system
Topic: Energy-optimised districts
Project insight with additional information
Project website: www.iw3-hamburg.de
Duration: 2020 to 2024
Funding: co-financed by the EU as part of the German Recovery and Resilience Plan (DARP)
Consortium leader: Hamburg Energie GmbH
State: Hamburg
Focus: Large city
Project: Sustainable heat supply for urban neighbourhoods
Summary: Wilhelmsburg in Hamburg shows with the IW3 real-world laboratory that a reliable and affordable heat supply based on renewable energies is possible. Heat, electricity and mobility are efficiently combined in the rapidly growing district.
A geothermal plant is used to extract geothermal energy from a depth of around 1,300 metres and feed it into a local district heating network. A cross-system technology platform links heat, electricity and mobility in the neighbourhood via a virtual power plant for an intelligent, efficient and renewable energy supply. The partners are developing an open heat marketplace for the real-world laboratory, via which heat from various sources and suppliers can be traded transparently, highly automated and efficiently. The concept of the integrated heat transition makes Wilhelmsburg a beacon for the energy and heat transition in urban areas, which can be transferred throughout Germany.
Topic: Energy-optimised districts
Project insight with additional information
Duration: 2022 to 2027
Consortium leader: Stadtwerke Jena Netze GmbH
State: Thuringa
Focus: Large city
Project: Energy-optimised real-world laboratory in Jena using energy storage systems that can be scaled in real time
Summary: The living lab is intended to serve as a blueprint for the future supply of electrical and thermal energy, with the mobility sector acting as a link. JenErgieReal aims to show how the various players in a city's energy system - producers, storage facilities and consumers - can be intelligently linked with each other to flexibly control load distribution in the grid. To this end, several photovoltaic and solar thermal systems as well as large-scale electrical storage systems are to be installed in Jena. These are virtually connected via an ICT platform. The project partners are investigating various approaches: Neighbourhood storage systems and grid-serving energy storage systems will be combined with CHP plants and charging stations for electric vehicles. At the same time, waste heat from the resulting fast charging processes is to be utilised. What's more, the project will be accompanied by research into potential improvements to the energy industry framework, integration into urban development and acceptance criteria for system users. After prototype development and field testing, the results will be presented to the public.
Topic: Energy-optimised districts
Project insight with additional information
Project website: smartquart.energy
Duration: 2020 to 2024
Consortium leader: innogy SE
State: North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate
Focus: Rural area, small town, large city
Project: Smart energy districts
Summary: In order to achieve the climate targets, the electricity transition must be turned into a "real" energy transition that links the energy, heating and mobility sectors more closely than before. SmartQuart aims to show that this is already technically and economically possible within a neighbourhood and in interaction with neighbouring neighbourhoods. Essen and Bedburg in North Rhine-Westphalia and Kaisersesch in Rhineland-Palatinate together form this living lab.
The urban neighbourhoods will be networked within themselves and with each other so that the existing energy infrastructures can be used efficiently. Smart grid solutions intelligently link heating, cooling, "green" electricity, hydrogen and the mobility sector. The aim is to achieve a climate-neutral energy supply in the model regions. Residents, energy suppliers and local technology providers are involved in all three urban neighbourhoods. SmartQuart represents typical urban neighbourhoods in a densely populated rural and urban area so that the concepts can be transferred to other neighbourhoods.
Topic: Energy-optimised districts
- Projektporträt auf dem Fachportal energiewendebauen.de mit ausführlichen Informationen
Project website: www.reallabor-transurban-nrw.de
Duration: 2020 to 2025
Funding: co-financed by the EU as part of the German Recovery and Resilience Plan (DARP)
Consortium leader: E.ON Energy Solutions GmbH
State: North Rhine-Westphalia
Focus: Medium-sized city, large city
Project: Transformation of grid-connected, urban heating and cooling supply with intersectoral Power-2-Heat solutions as a contribution to structural change in the coal-mining regions of NRW
Summary: The TransUrbanNRW living lab is transforming the heat supply at five locations in North Rhine-Westphalia. Until now, the neighbourhoods characterised by lignite mining have been supplied via district heating networks. In the real-world laboratory, the consortium is focussing on 5th generation heating networks that integrate renewable energies and waste heat at all temperature levels.
5th generation heating networks act as an energy platform for "prosumers" - i.e. for consumers who both use energy and provide it themselves, for example via their PV system on their own roof. The necessary generation mix for the provision of heating and cooling can be synthesised from fossil and CO2-free generation capacities in these heating networks. This enables a gradual transition from today's fossil-based generation to an electricity-based and increasingly renewable heating and cooling supply. In the course of the coal phase-out, the role of the traditional district heating supply company is thus changing into energy platform providers for heating, cooling, electricity and mobility.
Topic: Energy-optimised districts
Living labs of the energy transition on energy efficiency in industry
Additional information on the living lab can be found here.
Duration: 2024 to 2027
Consortium leader: TRIMET Aluminium SE
State: Hamburg, Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate
Focus: Use of a high-temperature superconductor busbar with 200,000 amps DC in the aluminium industry
Project: SuprAL – Supraleitendes Hochstromsystem 200 kA DC TRIMET Aluminium SE
Summary: Aluminium is a versatile material and is one of the so-called light metals due to its low weight. Demand in various sectors - such as the mobility sector, construction and the packaging industry - is immense. However, the production of primary aluminium is very energy-intensive and requires high direct currents. Reducing the high electricity demand and thus also CO2 emissions creates competitive advantages for the German aluminium industry and makes an important contribution to the energy transition and climate protection.
The SuprAL living lab is using high-temperature superconductivity (HTS) for this purpose. The busbars that currently supply the electrolysis furnaces in aluminium production with energy suffer heat losses due to electrical resistance. HTS technology, on the other hand, can transmit electrical energy almost loss-free and thus significantly reduce energy requirements. The SuprAL project partners therefore want to use a 600-metre-long conductor rail with high-temperature superconductors (HTSL) in TRIMET's Hamburg aluminium smelter and test it in practice.
Topic: Electrification of industry, energy-efficient power transmission, energy-saving industrial processes, high-temperature superconductivity
Living labs of the energy transition on sector coupling and hydrogen
Project insight with additional information
Project website: energiepark-bad-lauchstaedt.de
Duration: 2021 to 2025
Consortium leader: VNG AG
State: Sachsen-Anhalt
Focus: 35-Megawatt-Elektrolysis, gas and hydrogen grid
Project: Testing of the hydrogen value chain
Summary: New energy supply concepts are particularly in demand in regions undergoing structural change. In the Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park living lab in the central German chemical triangle, electricity from a wind farm is converted into hydrogen using an electrolysis process. To this end, the project partners are constructing a plant with a capacity of 30 megawatts, which is of system-relevant size. The hydrogen will then be supplied to the Leuna Chemical Park via a converted former natural gas pipeline and utilised there for chemical processes. At the Bad Lauchstädt energy park, experts are trialling the entire hydrogen value chain. In future, the energy source should help to make the Central German chemical industry more sustainable and maintain value creation in the region even after the structural change.
Topic: Sector coupling and hydrogen technologies
Project insight with additional information
Duration: 2021 to 2025
Consortium leader: VDEh-Betriebsforschungsinstitut GmbH (BFI)
State: North Rhine-Westphalia
Focus: 10.000 m3 per hour hydrogen injection into blast furnace and 6.5 km hydrogen pipeline
Project: Living lab on hydrogen technologies to decarbonize the steel industry step by step
Summary: Steel has characterised the Ruhr region. Today, Germany is the largest steel producer in the European Union. Reducing CO2 production here creates competitive advantages and makes a significant contribution to the energy transition and climate protection. The structural change towards a modern industrial location is supported.
The H2Stahl living lab uses hydrogen technologies to produce iron from ore. Up to now, pulverised coal has been used for this process in blast furnaces. In a transitional phase, pure hydrogen is to be added to the existing plants to partially decarbonise the process. The operators assume that this bridging technology will reduce CO2 emissions by 20 per cent. In order to further reduce CO2 emissions in later stages, the use of pure hydrogen in a test plant for direct reduction is being trialled in parallel.
Topic: Sector coupling and hydrogen technologies
Project insight with additional information
Project website: www.energiedienst.de
Duration: 2021 to 2025
Consortium leader: Energiedienst AG
State: Baden-Württemberg
Focus: Up to 10 megawatts of alkaline electrolysis with electricity from hydropower plant
Project: Development and investigation of a test room for the local energy and raw material supply of the building, transport and industry sectors based on renewable, electricity-based hydrogen
Summary: Hydrogen as an energy storage medium is an important building block for a sustainable and clean energy supply. Its utilisation means no or only very low greenhouse gas emissions. In the electrolysis plant in Grenzach-Wyhlen on the Rhine, water is split into hydrogen and oxygen using electricity from the local run-of-river power plant. The hydrogen can then be used in a variety of ways. With H2-Wyhlen, the existing power-to-hydrogen infrastructure in Grenzach-Wyhlen is to be expanded into a test area with the neighbouring district and industrial site: Business models for the needs-based production, local distribution and utilisation of the gas in the various sectors are to be developed in advance and tested if they are viable. Research is being conducted into the development of large-scale, ready-to-use electrolysis technology. Research is also being conducted into how the process heat can be utilised. Accompanying research is also taking social factors into account. After the funding period, the overall system should be developed to such an extent that it can be operated economically.
Topic: Sector coupling and hydrogen technologies
Project insight with additional information
Project website: www.norddeutsches-reallabor.de
Duration: 2021 to 2025
Consortium leader: Competence Center für Erneuerbare Energien und EnergieEffizienz (CC4E) der Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften Hamburg
State: Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
Focus: Electrolysis with a total of 77 megawatts; H2 refuelling stations and transport
Project: North German living lab - the energy transition alliance for sector coupling
Summary: The aim of the North German living lab is to test the holistic transformation of the energy system and thus contribute to the rapid decarbonisation of all consumption sectors. Spread across five geographical "hubs" in Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, large-scale concepts for sector coupling are to be developed with a focus on hydrogen and energy-efficient neighbourhood solutions in the heating sector.
In order to save CO2, for example, residues from refineries are to be further processed with "green" hydrogen. The effects of adding hydrogen to natural gas burners will also be investigated. In order to integrate the transport sector systemically, more fuel cell vehicles are to be used and hydrogen refuelling stations promoted. To drive forward the heating transition, the partners also want to utilise the waste heat from a waste incineration plant and an industrial plant using existing district heating pipes. The planned projects of the North German living lab can save around 560,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions per year.
Topic: Sector coupling and hydrogen technologies, district solutions
Project insight with additional information
Project website: www.reflau.com
Duration: 2023 to 2027
Consortium leader: Referenzkraftwerk Lausitz GmbH
State: Brandenburg and Saxony
Focus: 10 mega watt PEM Electrolysis, 1 mega watt grid control power station
Project: Reference power plant Lausitz
Summary: The industrial location of Lusatia was previously characterised by open-cast lignite mining. As part of the energy transition, the region is adapting to the requirements of the future energy system and is focussing on hydrogen as a promising energy source. This is promoting structural change, securing jobs and helping to play a pioneering role in the further development of new energy technologies.
In the Lausitz reference power plant real-world laboratory, the consortium wants to test hydrogen as a chemical storage medium in practice and drive forward a CO2-neutral, cross-sector energy supply for the region. A storage power plant fuelled by green hydrogen will provide electricity and heat for all sectors. The gas is also to be fed into the existing natural gas grid. In addition, the partners want to identify legal and regulatory hurdles that make it difficult to operate the various technologies economically and reduce them by making specific recommendations for action.
Topic: Sector coupling and hydrogen technologies
Duration: 2024 to 2028
Consortium leader: HEITEC Innovations GmbH
State: Bavaria
Focus: Hybrid power plant including a digital twin
Project: REMBup - Sector coupled hybrid power plant for CO2 neutral energy supply of the Nürnberg trade show
Summary: The REMBup project aims to implement and test a reliable, climate-neutral energy supply for NürnbergMesse GmbH. The project partners, led by HEITEC Innovations GmbH from Erlangen, are focusing on new solutions for predictive energy management, energy storage, simulation and digitalisation in order to meet the challenges of sector coupling and grid reliability.
Close cooperation between the partners from industry and research is intended to ensure that the planned secure and sustainable energy system can be created using a mixture of established technologies and innovative approaches. The centrepiece is a hybrid energy power plant. The project consortium uses electricity, heat, cooling and hydrogen for the supply. With the help of a digital twin of the power plant, the partners want to guarantee the best possible and predictive control. The model-based energy management system is optimised in real time.
Topic: Sector coupling
Project insight with additional information
Project website: www.westkueste100.de
Duration: 2020 to 2025
Consortium leader: Raffinerie Heide GmbH
State: Schleswig-Holstein
Focus: 30-Megawatt-Elektrolysis, cavern storage, gas and hydrogen network
Project: Green hydrogen and decarbonizing on an industrial scale
Summary: With WESTKÜSTE100, the "Heide model region" is being created. This is a small-scale test of what industrialised society should be able to achieve in the future on as large a scale as possible: the virtually climate-neutral generation of energy and production of goods. To achieve this, the project partners want to convert electricity from wind into hydrogen using a 30 megawatt electrolyser. The gas can then be channelled and used as required, including for the production of CO2-neutral fuel.
The hydrogen is to be stored in a salt cavern in this living lab. A model network for transporting hydrogen to various customers is also planned. In addition, the oxygen obtained during electrolysis is to be converted into high-purity carbon dioxide in the combustion process in a cement plant around 60 kilometres away. This can be used to produce chemical base materials for solvents, for example. The consortium is also developing operating and business models as well as recommendations for the further development of the regulatory framework.
Topic: Sector coupling and hydrogen technologies