Saint-Gobain Glass Germany plans for 2030 carbon neutral production
Hendrik Wüst, Minister-President of North Rhine-Westphalia, and Prof. Dr. Andreas Pinkwart, Minister of Economic Affairs, Innovation, Digitalisation and Energy, recently visited the Saint-Gobain site in Herzogenrath. They learned about the planned project for CO2-neutral production by 2030 on the site and, in this context, presented Saint-Gobain Glass Germany and Saint-Gobain Sekurit Germany with around €1.9 million in funding for the preparatory R&D project "COSIMa, CO2-neutral Saint-Gobain industrial location Herzogenrath – feasibility studies."
As part of COSIMa, Saint-Gobain is examining the possibilities of an innovative CO2-neutral glass production and glass processing site in Herzogenrath by the beginning of 2025, which will be one of the first of its kind in the world.
For this purpose, the use of green hydrogen for glass production, energy saving measures for glass processing into automotive glazing as well as the energetically and economically optimal energy use and generation at the entire site are to be investigated and modelled in cooperation with the city of Herzogenrath and neighbouring municipalities.
The project is carried out in cooperation with the Gas and Heat Institute Essen as well as the Institute of Technical Thermodynamics, the Institute of Industrial Furnace Construction and Thermal Engineering and the Institute for Power Generation and Storage of RWTH Aachen University, which receive state funding of about €1.7 million for this purpose.
The overall project will therefore receive a state subsidy of €3.6 million with an expected total expenditure of €5.6 million. If successful, the Saint-Gobain site could be operating in a climate-neutral manner from 2030.
Image (left to right): Prof. Dr. Andreas Pinkwart, Minister für Wirtschaft, Innovation, Digitalisierung und Energie in Nordrhein-Westfalen, Hendrik Wüst, Ministerpräsident von Nordrhein-Westfalen, Raimund Heinl, CEO Saint-Gobain Germany & Austria, Dr. Jochen Eickholt, Siemens Energy, and Stephan Kranz, CEO Saint-Gobain Glass Deutschland
