Lightweight construction is one of the central pillars for making a significant contribution to achieving necessary climate and sustainability goals – while maintaining competitiveness.
Alexander Pirang, officer at the Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection (BMWK), presented the lightweighting activities of the BMWK. Among other things, he pointed to the Lightweighting Initiative, the fourth Lightweighting Summit and the Lightweighting Atlas, as well as the Technology Transfer Program for Lightweight Construction (TTP LB). The TTP LB of the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection aims to support innovative projects in lightweight construction: Different areas such as “technology field”, “material” and “manufacturing process” are supported. The technology transfer program is implemented by Project Management Jülich. Since the program was launched in April 2020, around 73 million in funding has been made available each year. The goals of the technology transfer program include: To contribute to achieving sustainability and climate goals, to exploit innovation and value creation potential, to maintain a broad industrial application of lightweight construction and to further develop lightweight construction as a technology of the future.
Dr. Reinhard Marth from the Sustainable Development and Innovation Business Unit of Projektträger Jülich Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH gave an overview of the Lightweight Construction Technology Transfer Program and presented the formal aspects that applicants must observe. Accordingly, commercial companies with a permanent establishment or branch in Germany as well as universities and research institutions can apply for funding. Both individual and joint projects are funded – participation by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is expressly desired. The share of approved projects by sector shows that lightweight construction is also important for the “enabler sector” of mechanical and plant engineering: According to this, mechanical engineering takes second position after the automotive industry and ahead of the aviation sector.
The Hybrid Lightweight Technologies working group, founded in 2016, is a contact point for VDMA member companies that offer technologies for manufacturing components and parts in multi-material design. The working group is equally interesting for users and suppliers as well as research institutions from the technology field of lightweight construction. The aim of the working group is to act as a Europe-wide platform for exchanging experience in the field of production processes, automation and joining technologies. The WG would also like to serve as a contact point for the exchange of knowledge in order to promote series production in lightweight construction and to create jobs in this future field in the long term. Interested parties can contact the project manager of the VDMA Working Group Hybrid Lightweight Technologies, Dámaso López Ruiz (damaso.lopez@vdma.org), to find partners for joint projects or to collaborate on joint projects in the field of lightweight construction.
Organizer
The event was offered by ProduktionNRW. ProduktionNRW is the competence network of mechanical engineering and production technology in North Rhine-Westphalia and is run by VDMA NRW. ProduktionNRW sees itself as a platform for networking, informing and marketing companies, institutions and networks among themselves and along the value chain. Significant parts of the services provided by ProduktionNRW are funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).