Press

The aerospace industry is undergoing profound change. Companies are facing the challenge of having to drastically shorten development cycles, develop more sustainable technologies and reduce costs, all at the same time. In addition, advances in satellite technology require new manufacturing approaches to make systems smaller, lighter and more powerful. While government space programs continue to play a major role here, private players such as SpaceX, Blue Origin and Rocket Lab are driving the commercialization of space travel and setting new standards for efficiency and profitability: Competition has never been so fierce.

Battery production is at the heart of industrial and climate policy worldwide. Indeed, the demand for energy storage systems for electromobility and stationary applications is growing globally as is the importance of efficient, sustainable and regionally independent battery production.

In the face of advancing climate change, we drastically need to monitor and understand the various sources and sinks of greenhouse gases worldwide in real time. One focus to accomplish this is to regulate and monitor man-made methane emissions. Laser systems, as developed by researchers at Fraunhofer ILT, offer ways to do exactly this: At the heart of LIDAR instruments, they can precisely determine greenhouse gases in the atmosphere with high spatial and temporal resolution, even from great distances, and do so worldwide.

Electrode drying in the roll-to-roll process (R2R) has so far been one of the most cost- and CO2-intensive manufacturing steps in the production of lithium-ion batteries. A laser-based R2R drying process developed as part of the IDEEL research cooperation could change this in the future. It combines conventional, oven-based convection drying with laser drying using high-power diode lasers and reduces the drying time by more than 60 percent while maintaining the same quality of results.