Thursday, April 16, 2026
Project meeting MemKoWi
The 7th project meeting of the BMWE research project MemKoWI (Membrane processes for the separation of carbon dioxide and hydrogen from industrial gases) took place in Saarbrücken on 14–15 April 2026. The experts involved in the project held in-depth discussions on the latest findings regarding the separation of CO₂ and H₂ using membranes from process gases in the steel industry and flue gases from power stations.
In this project, BFI is investigating the separation of hydrogen from blast furnace and coke oven gas. The membrane test facility designed for this purpose has been successfully installed at the BFI and is currently being commissioned, prior to operational deployment in a few weeks’ time at the steelworks near Dillingen.
As part of the meeting, a tour of Iqony’s Warndt green wood power plant took place. There, the membrane process for CO2 separation from flue gas – already tested by project partners Helmholtz Centre Hereon and Forschungszentrum Jülich at the Dillinger blast furnace gas power plant – will be deployed in the coming weeks.
At the end of the project meeting, the group visited the large-scale construction site of the Power4Steel project at Dillinger, where a hydrogen-based direct reduction plant and an electric arc furnace for decarbonisation in the steel industry are being built.
The project will also involve further investigations using the flue gases from the cement plant of partner thyssenkrupp Polysius in Beckum, which will be supported by HEREON, FZ Jülich and the DVGW Research Centre at the Engler-Bunte Institute of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). Both polymer membranes and ceramic support membranes from atech innovations gmbh, which have been treated with a novel selective coating from FZ Jülich, will be tested. The project is supported by the associated partner Linde GmbH.
We look forward to deploying our mobile BFI containerised membrane plant for hydrogen separation on the steelworks site and are keen to see how the plant performs during the test campaigns under real-world conditions.
Many thanks to our hosts Iqony and Dillinger for the successful project meeting!
