A consortium has been formed in France by ENGIE, Fives, Saverglass and Verescence to support the industrial glass sector in its efforts to decarbonise glass production by evaluating energy sources for a sustainable industrial process.

The VERCANE R&D programme aims to develop sustainable scenarios of energy transition by designing solutions based on decarbonised energy sources.

Different carbon neutral energy systems will be studied that could be compatible with the glass melting process, including hydrogen, bioresources and process electrification. Furthermore, VERCANE is exploring possibilities to adapt existing melting furnaces to new energy sources.

Targeting viability and sustainability, the first phase of the project also takes into account available territorial and local resources and transport solutions to the production site.

The project will ultimately include case studies at the production sites of Saverglass and Verescence, with a view to preparing the deployment of large-scale industrial demonstrators.

ENGIE, through its ENGIE Lab CRIGEN Research Centre and ENGIE Solutions, energy partner, is in charge of project co-ordination, energy vectors analysis, numerical simulation studies and will ensure the prospective vision of the energy context.

Industrial partners Saverglass and Verescence bring to the project real case studies on their industrial sites and will contribute to the realisation of technical work packages involving their knowhow of glass production in melting furnaces.

Technological partner, Fives is in charge of analysing the challenges related to the technological retrofit of furnaces to new carbon-free energy sources and will provide its knowhow in the design and implementation of these processes.

www.fivesgroup.com