02/14/2025 | Campus-Meldung

Project launched for CO2 balancing in mechanical and plant engineering

The research project "acCO2unt.log - process and design-based CO2 balancing for one-off and small series manufacturers in mechanical and plant engineering using the example of logistics processes" is being implemented in cooperation between the Department of Production Organization and Factory Planning at the University of Kassel and the Industry Analytics Research Group at the Institute for Management and Information at the West Saxon University of Applied Sciences Zwickau. The aim of the research project is to develop an IT platform for determining the CO2 footprint of customer-specific unique products.

The topic of sustainability is becoming increasingly important in the German mechanical and plant engineering sector. Although small and medium-sized enterprises are not (yet) subject to statutory reporting obligations such as the European Union's Directive 2022/2464 with regard to corporate sustainability reporting, they are nevertheless affected as suppliers and will have to determine their ecological footprint along their logistics chain in the future. Prof. Dr.-Ing. Sigrid Wenzel and Prof. Dr. Christoph Laroque are working with their teams in the research project to develop solutions for determining the_{CO2 footprint} of customer-specific unique products. The aim is to develop an IT platform with various IT services for data collection and analysis as well as for calculating, visualizing and forecasting the_{CO2 footprint}. In addition to the production processes, the focus is on all logistical sub-processes within production (including upstream/downstream logistics processes) up to the handover of the system to the customer. The IT platform will be implemented as a demonstrator, which will be evaluated using application scenarios at several small and medium-sized companies.

The project will be supported by a project support committee made up of members from industry and associations in order to test its practical suitability: Alpha Sigma GmbH, ams.Solution AG, Limón GmbH, N+P Informationssysteme GmbH, OWL Mechanical Engineering e.V., Siemens AG, SimPlan AG, SITEC Industrietechnologie GmbH, Tisora Sondermaschinen GmbH, TransMit Gesellschaft für Technologietransfer mbH, Verbund Mechanical Engineering in Sachsen/Thüringen e.V. (VEMAS e.V.), Zukunftsallianz Mechanical Engineering e.V. The first meeting of the project support committee will take place online on April 8, 2025 to discuss the expectations of the project and the project results on the part of the companies. The project support committee is of course open to interested companies.

The research project with the funding code 01IF23475N is funded by the German Aerospace Center (DLR), DLR Project Management Agency (DLR-PT) as part of the "Industrial Collective Research (IGF)" program by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection (BMWK) on behalf of the Federal Logistics Association (BVL) on the basis of a resolution of the German Bundestag. The project will run from February 2025 to October 2026. Further information on the research project or on possible theses can be found at www.accountlog.de or on the specialist pages of the participating research centers.

Contact:

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Sigrid Wenzel
University of Kassel
Institute of Production Engineering and Logistics
Department of Production Organization and Factory Planning
Phone: +49 561 804-1851
Email: sekretariat-pfp[at]uni-kassel[dot]de

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