Karlsruhe Institute of Technology

The Institute for Technical Chemistry, ITC has its key competence in the field of thermal processes for solid and liquid fuels and in gas cleaning. Based on a long tradition in solid fuel combustion, today’s research topics are pyrolysis and gasification of solid and liquid fuels.

The theoretical and experimental research work of the division “Gasification Technology” of ITC is focused on high pressure entrained flow gasification processes for biomass based and fossil fuels. In the frame of KIT´s bioliq®-process, special emphasis is put on the entrained flow gasification of biomass based slurry, i.e. solid coke suspended in a liquid matrix. The research objective is the detailed understanding and mathematical description of the physico-chemical process steps of the conversion of a multi-phase fuel under high pressure gasification conditions. Experimental work is carried out e.g. at the lab-scale atmospheric research entrained flow gasifier, REGA for the thermo-chemical conversion of slurry and in the world wide unique pressurized atomization test rig, PAT for the atomization of high-viscous liquid fuels under high pressure. Numerical simulation tools (Aspen, Chemkin, Fluent) are applied for interpretation of experimental results and mathematical description of the multi-phase conversion processes.

The world wide recognized very successful scientific work of the institute is based on the expertise of the multidisciplinary staff comprising experts from various scientific and technical sectors and the opportunity to do experimental investigations in a broad range of scales from laboratory through semi-technical set-ups and pilot plants up to full scale plants. This unique combination guarantees for a good balance of basic research and application oriented development.

KIT / ITC Homepage: http://www.itc-tab.kit.edu/