Power & Environmental Technologies in Thuringia

Thuringia has been making cars for over a hundred years. It still draws enormous expertise from this well of tradition. Local universities produce far more engineers than the national average.

The following colleges and universities offer engineering degree programs directly related to the automotive sector or other specialized degree programs such as mechanical engineering, mechatronics, electrical engineering and material flow and logistics or mobility management:

Not only does Thuringia have an outstanding research infrastructure, but it places a premium on building strong relationships between business and science.

Selected research institutes

• Fraunhofer Institute for Ceramic Technologies and Systems (IKTS), Hermsdorf
• Fraunhofer Application Center System Technology AST (part of Fraunhofer IOSB), Ilmenau
• Battery Innovation and Technology Center (BITC), Arnstadt
• Center for Energy and Environmental Chemistry (CEEC), Jena
• HySON Institute for Applied Hydrogen Research, Sonneberg
• IAB – Weimar Institute of Applied Construction Research, Weimar
• Institute for Renewable Energy Technology (in.RET), Nordhausen
• Thuringian Energy Research Institute (ThEFI), Ilmenau
• Thuringian Innovation Center for Recyclables (ThIWert), Nordhausen
   

Missing links
In Thuringia, we are researching the missing links of the energy transition: electrical and thermal energy storage, sector coupling as well as hydrogen production,
transportation and storage. Flagship projects include research at Fraunhofer IKTS into sodiumion batteries for stationary energy storage and the peerless redox flow batteries based on polymers developed at the CEEC. New players emerging along the hydrogen production value chain include application-oriented research hubs such as HySON and new research programs at the Ilmenau University of Technology for producing green hydrogen directly from solar water splitting.