The Finnish-Dutch company has developed the RotoDynamic Heater (RDH), which is powered by electricity from renewable sources and achieves process temperatures up to 1700 ºC.
RDH has been tested successfully in a pilot project in Finland and will be available for commercial use in 2024. CEMEX has signed up to use RDH to reduce CO2 emissions from cement production.
In a statement, Roberto Ponguta, CEMEX vice-president of Global Operations, Technical and Energy said "The electrification of the production process is an important step towards fully decarbonising our cement operations. We are constantly looking for the best technologies and relationships to meet our Net Zero CO2 target.”
Coolbrook believes RDH is the only electric technology capable of reaching temperatures required in high-emitting industrial sectors such as petrochemicals and chemicals, iron and steel and cement. The company added RDH can be retrofitted to existing facilities, which could accelerate investment in CO2 abatement.
The technology has been in development for over a decade and marks the second major technology developed by Coolbrook after its RotoDynamic Reactor (RDR), which can be used to electrify the steam cracking process in the petrochemical industry.
Ilpo Kuokkanen, executive chairman of Coolbrook, said: “Today marks the beginning of a new clean industrial era. Coolbrook has set a target to build a committed and comprehensive ecosystem around its revolutionary technology to commercialise it as soon as possible.
“Together with ABB, CEMEX, Shell and our other partners in industry, academia, public sector and among key decision-makers we can roll out this revolutionary technology and achieve significant emission reductions in the most energy and CO2 intensive industrial processes that have been considered impossible to electrify.”
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