GEA Mobile Minor spray dryer is being used to support the Institute for Applied Materials (IAM-ESS) at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT).
With more than 9,000 employees, KIT focuses on the fields of energy transition, future mobility, and technologies for the information society through its research contributions. The IAM-ESS currently has three of GEA’s spray dryers.
Sample quantities are sufficient to evaluate potential battery materials for lithium-ion batteries, GEA says. If a material shows promising electrochemical properties though, its performance must be validated on a larger scale. With the company’s spray dryer, small to medium quantities of solutions, suspensions or emulsions can be dried into representative powder samples. In this way, the process data required for industrial use of the production are determined.
GEA supplied the MM-100 spray dryer for KTI, which is the latest addition to the range. It’s equipped with the CEE (cyclone extra efficiency) which offers higher separation efficiency, increasing the available yield and reducing emissions.
KIT conducts research into the production of novel materials for energy storage, for example for Li-ion batteries (LiBs) and post-lithium systems. One focus is on better understanding materials chemistry and design, as well as developing ceramic processes that enable the production of future-proof components and resources.
A medium-sized synthesis plant is being built at KIT, where two of the company’s spray dryers will be used to produce the required battery materials. The pilot plant is aimed to fulfil several tasks, including the transfer from small-scale laboratory synthesis to scalable processes, the production of multiple materials for the manufacture of large lithium-ion battery cells and a few selected materials for the manufacture of battery systems.
The key requirements for the facility are maintaining powder quality during scale-up and ensuring reproducibility. The medium-scale synthesis plant enables both a reliable process for material synthesis and a high degree of flexibility in material and process optimisation, GEA says.
