Important insights into industrial processes and a concrete idea of how engineers in various professions tackle current challenges - this is what TUBAF students Clara Zerbs and Fabian Bertram take away from an excursion to the Eisenhüttenstadt steelworks. There, ArcelorMittal is trialling the production of green steel. The industrial excursion with a total of 11 students was funded by the scholarship programme of the Centre for Efficient High-Temperature Material Conversion (ZeHS).
"I have long had the vision of visiting a steelworks to gain a real insight and also to be able to talk to the employees on site about how steel is becoming greener in practice," says Clara Zerbs, process engineering student and ZeHS scholarship holder in the winter semester 2024/25, who connetcted with the company. "I want to actively help shape the future with my studies - for example by making technologies greener!"
Master's student Fabian Bertram adds: "Within my degree programme, I can combine my interest in technology with the motivation to tackle climate change. During the excusion, I found the approach of decarbonising the production of pig iron with so-called sponge iron from renewable energy particularly interesting."
Green technologies for more climate-friendly steel
In the steelworks, the students followed the use of pig iron through to finished semi-finished products. These are, for example, large coils of flat steel, which are then further processed in the automotive industry. "A particular emphasis was placed on developments towards green and renewable technologies, which is also one of the research tasks of the ZeHS," emphasises scientific spokesperson Professor Dirk Meyer. "Steel inevitably contains carbon. Accordingly, carbon cycle technologies are inevitably important, and Freiberg is working intensively on this," says Professor Martin Gräbner, Deputy Director of the ZeHS.
The excursion to Eisenhüttenstadt and the exciting day programme were made possible by funding from a foundation under the umbrella of the Stifterverband. A video production by the university's media centre accompanied the students. "It's great that it is possible to introduce university students to the labour market with external support. The fact that there is also a palpable sense of enjoyment is in line with our shared ideas," says Professor Dirk Meyer.
- dirk-carl [dot] meyer [at] physik [dot] tu-freiberg [dot] de (Prof. Dr. Dirk C. Dirk Meyer) and theresa [dot] lemser [at] zehs [dot] tu-freiberg [dot] de (Ass. iur. Theresa Lemser), scientific spokesperson and advisor of the ZeHS
- Clara-Christina [dot] Zerbs [at] student [dot] tu-freiberg [dot] de (Clara Zerbs), scholarship holder, student on the Process Engineering degree programme specialising in energy process engineering
