Electrification of Process Heat by use of High-Power Microwave Technology

The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), the Research University in the Helmholtz Association creates and imparts knowledge for the society and the environment. From fundamental research to applications, KIT excels in a broad range of disciplines. Within the Helmholtz Program Materials and Technologies for the Energy Transition (MTET), the Institute for Pulsed Power and Microwave Technology (IHM) is conducting applied research and development in the field of materials processing with microwaves. As a spin-off from nuclear fusion research activities, high power gyrotrons used for plasma heating in fusion reactors were applied for high temperature processing of materials such as ceramics, glasses and metals, starting 30 year ago. Since then, these microwave activities have been continuously expanded to novel applications, such as the curing of fiber-reinforced plastics, pultrusion, 3D printing, plasma chemistry and others, using industrial microwave sources such as magnetrons and solid-state amplifiers.
All those activities are motivated by increasing productivity and energy efficiency while reducing CO2 emissions by replacing fossil energy sources with microwave energy powered by renewable electricity. ... mehrAn overview of related developments at KIT and latest research results will be presented.