news 2017

Pearl millet genome sequence provides a resource to improve agronomic traits in extreme environments An international consortium under the lead of the non-profit organization "International Crops Res

By Ulrike Keller Nikolaus Schwaiger co-developed the BioCRACK process. High-grade and eco-friendly diesel fuel is produced from biomass such as wooden waste, straw and reeds. The findings are impressive. "In comparison with fossil fuels, the fuel generated in the bioCRACK plant saves 85 per cent of greenhouse gases," explains chemical engineer Nikolaus Schwaiger.

Without fossil fuels, there can be no blast furnace process - but hydrogen could play a more important role in the future. An environmentally friendly process is being developed at TU Wien by which biomass can be used to produce a hydrogen-rich gas that can then be employed in various ways in the iron and steel industry.

How can we burn natural gas without releasing CO2 into the air? This feat is achieved using a special combustion method that TU Wien has been researching for years: chemical looping combustion (CLC). In this process, CO2 can be isolated during combustion without having to use any additional energy, which means it can then go on to be stored.

Under the leadership of the Environmental Sciences Research Network of the University of Vienna, the key national actors in long-term ecological research (LTER) join forces to establish a new infrastructure for the collection of environmental data. Funded by the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG), the project aims to collect data on the effects of extreme climatic events on the carbon, water and nitrogen cycle in ecosystems by establishing six cutting-edge measurement sites.