The Dream project, supported by the EU program Horizon 2020 for Research and Innovation has officially started at the beginning of October with its kick off meeting held in Brussels.
DREAM, acronym of Design for Resource and Energy efficiency in ceramic kilns, put together some of the main European players in the field of technologies for ceramic industry and aims at developing an innovative approach to kilns for ceramic production
The project has been funded by the European Community with 5 million euros and during the next three years is aimed at the development, construction and validation of technologies to meet a significant reduction in energy consumption and pollutant emissions. The final output will be an innovative kiln to be marketed by Sacmi in 2019.
The study will focus new engineering technologies for ceramic production kilns: a biofuel-feeding CHP unit; the study of a tool for modelling, simulation and control of the firing parameters; the use of new exchangers to recover waste heat; the setup of coatings and new refractory materials to improve kiln insulation and a new device for monitoring and reduction of kilns emissions.
Two are the goals that the European Commission is seeking by supporting this project: first of all, to produce concrete and measurable improvements in people’s real life: from a 20% reduction in energetic consumption, to a 20% operational costs reduction, up to a 30% emissions reduction. Second, these technologies will grant quick payback costs – lower than 3 years - for the end user.
The possibility of technological transfer to other and different industrial sectors making a large use of thermal energy will be also carefully evaluated.
Eleven partners are involved in the project under the lead of Sacmi and the support of CRIT - Italian company devoted to Technological Innovation – they are:
Rath (Germany) world leader in refractory products manufacturing, supported by the research institute Forschungsgemeinschaft Feuerfest;
Keraben Grupo (Spain) and Mirage/Atlas Concorde (Italy), both leaders in ceramic tiles production; the company Econotherm (UK), specialized in waste heat recycling technology, supported by the research of Brunel University; UNIMORE (University of Modena and Reggio Emilia) in charge for the numerical and theoretical analysis of the firing process and Synesis, a specialized company in manufacturing process innovation.
The Spanish Institute ITC, also a main partner of the project, will develop a new technique of exhausts treatment aimed to increase the reduction of polluting substances and, as a further contribution, a complete study of the cooling tile’s process in terms of residual stresses.