2 minute read
Clean heat for manufacturing
"We can't live without the industrial sector, nor can we live with the levels of carbon pollution it creates.”
Jennifer Granholm, U.S. Secretary of Energy
The U.S. Department of Energy selected ASU to establish a new Clean Energy Manufacturing Innovation Institute devoted to reducing greenhouse gas emissions from industrial process heating, the use of thermal energy to produce, treat or alter manufactured goods. The industrial sector currently accounts for more than 30% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, and fossil fuel-driven process heating — from pasteurizing milk to melting steel — is the most significant contributor.
The new institute, Electrified Processes for Industry Without Carbon (EPIXC), will support expanded use of clean electricity for the heating used to prepare materials and produce manufactured goods. The end result will be a dramatic reduction of carbon dioxide emissions across industrial sectors, including iron and steel, chemicals, petroleum, food and beverage, forest products, and cement.
Operating as a public-private partnership, EPIXC will conduct innovative research, development, demonstration and deployment of relevant technologies as well as workforce training to meet the growing demand for electric technicians to develop, install and maintain the new equipment. EPIXC joins the DOE’s six other Manufacturing USA institutes, which convene the nation’s brightest minds to solve the country’s toughest manufacturing challenges and move novel electrification processes out of the lab and into the market.
EPIXC is mobilizing a coalition of private companies, national labs, universities, labor unions and community partners to build an industrial sector that is more resilient, efficient and competitive and set the United States on a path to net-zero emissions by 2050.
