Materials technology

Requirements for a high level of flexibility on the part of power stations designed for base load make an optimum condition assessment necessary in order to predict service life with greater accuracy.

A precise understanding of the interaction between hydrogen and the material in question is essential for future hydrogen applications.

A sound understanding of corrosion processes, their causes and products forms the basis for developing effective protection against corrosion and reliable corrosion monitoring.

In both thermal power stations and wind turbines, condition monitoring for large GFRP components using online and offline monitoring systems is becoming increasingly important to be able to determine component integrity as the length of service life increases.

The investigations needed for materials research are being performed in RWE’s own materials laboratory, where its highly qualified employees have access to the latest equipment, including:

• Scanning electron microscopes with EDX and EBSD
• Hardness testers (micro/macro), manual/automatic
• Optical microscopes (reflected and transmitted light)
• Differential thermal analysis (DTA) with thermogravimetry (TG)
• Mass spectrometers
• Gas phase FTIR
• And much more