News In Brief 2020

STEAG New Energies GmbH, Saarbrücken/Germany, and the Zweckverband Geo-wärme Erding (Erding Geothermal Energy Association) are expanding the existing Erding 1 combined heat and power plant, which will enable up to 18 % of the total heating requirements of the Bavarian district town of Erding to be covered by geothermal energy in the future (Figure 1). This climate-friendly method will also supply the Erding ...

The energy demand for heating and lighting in Germany has decreased in the last ten years (Figure 1). According the current calculations by the Working Group on Energy Balances (AG Energiebilanzen), the heating demand in 2018 was 17 % lower than in 2008. A significant proportion of this change is due to temperature differences between the two years. After compensating for ...

The year 2019 was the turning point for renewable energy projects at remote mines. More than a dozen projects were commissioned or announced. Mining companies have adopted solar and wind power to reduce their energy cost and carbon footprint in a rather lengthy process. In the last years, successful flagship projects have removed concerns about production loss and independent power ...

With regards to work safety, health- and environmental protection the enterprise WESTKALK Vereinigte Warsteiner Kalksteinindustrie GmbH & Co. KG, Warstein/Germany, is planning to install an own extraction system for limestone spillage in their jet mill at the factory in Kallenhardt (Figure 1). This is supposed to improve the plant’s cleanliness and reduce dust exposure for staff members and surroundings long-term. ...

More than a year has passed since the last two mines of the RAG Aktiengesellschaft, Essen/Germany, ceased production. Despite the halt in production, however, work continues both above and below ground at the mines of Prosper-Haniel in Bottrop and Ibbenbüren in the Tecklenburg region. Indeed, there were a number of tasks that remained to be completed in a reliable and ...

The works councils of RAG Aktiengesellschaft, Essen/Germany, and the social partners of the company were the recipients of a special honour at the most recent award ceremony for the German Works Councils’ Prize in Bonn. On the occasion of the annual Conference of German Works Councils, they were presented with a special prize that was awarded for the first time ...

STEAG Solar Energy Solutions (SENS), the most recent subsidiary of the STEAG Group, Essen/Germany, is growing steadily in the field of renewable energy. André Kremer, Managing Director of SENS, and Matej Lednicky, Head of Transaction Management Infrastructure with the investment company KGAL Investment Management GmbH & Co. KG, confirmed their cooperation in Italy when they signed the contract in Milan. ...

At the Smart Mining Conference 2019 on 19th to 20th November 2019, various approaches to the digitization and automation of mining processes were presented. The conference, organized by the Institute for Advanced Mining Technologies (AMT) of RWTH Aachen University in cooperation with DMT GmbH und Co. KG and VDMA Mining, brought together more than 200 national and international experts at ...

According to preliminary calculations from the Working Group on Energy Balances (AG Energiebilanzen), Berlin/Germany, energy consumption in Germany reached 12,815 PJ or 437.3 Mtce (Figure 1) in 2019. This is a decline of 2.3 % compared to the previous year. AG Energiebilanzen claims that this reduction in consumption was due to additional improvements in energy efficiency, energy mix substitutions and a decline in ...

In contrast to the general trend, manufacturers of mining machinery in Germany are expecting 2019 to have been one of the best years on record. The German Engineering Federation (VDMA), Frankfurt am Main/Germany, is anticipating an increase in turnover of 38 % that would amount to around 5 bn €. This revenue should at the very least be maintained in 2020. In ...