A dream of mankind... unlimited energy without harming the environment. The team of Rolf Kind GmbH, based in the small town of Lindlar, around 40 km east of Cologne / Germany, is working hard every day to make this dream come true in the hopefully not too distant future. "Our components will help to ignite a huge fire that has never been seen before, and our collaboration with CERN plays a crucial role in this process", says Markus Kind, Commercial Director and one of two shareholders in the family business.
The fire refers to the last primary energy source that is known but not yet usable: nuclear fusion, the fusion of nuclei. Atoms are to be shot together with enormous forces in order to generate much more energy than that needed to produce the collisions. The power of the sun and stars, as the physicists say. Because in the sun, many billions of such nuclei fuse every second, releasing enormous amounts of heat in the process.
There are high hopes for nuclear fusion. Supporters speak of a safe and inexhaustible source of energy that does not damage the environment. The fuel used in fusion, usually isotopes of hydrogen, does not release any greenhouse gases. This will be an advantage over fossil fuels.
It is clear that the demand for electricity will grow enormously, not only in other regions of the world, but also as a result of the climate change. Renewable energies alone will not be able to meet this demand in the future. And unlike nuclear fission with uranium, for example, nuclear fusion produces hardly any radioactive waste.
Fusion research is likely to create a whole new industry for the construction and operation of the power plants of tomorrow. Start-ups, spin-offs of research institutes and industrial companies are currently developing prototypes and collecting money from investors. In addition to the best-known project, the ITER fusion research reactor in Cadarache in the south of France, there are around 40 fusion projects worldwide, mainly in the USA, Germany, Japan and China. Billions have already been invested.
For more than two decades, Rolf Kind GmbH has been supplying complex and heavy-duty forgings that will help control the fusion fire, "plasma" as the experts call it, providing the metallic structure around the powerful magnets. Over the years, the company has supplied more than 7,000 tons of stainless-steel components for fusion projects all over the world.
“Fusion technology has the potential to become a real game changer and transform our planet for good”, explains Markus Kind. “If we succeed in bringing this technology to market maturity, we will have a safe, inexhaustible and reliable source of energy.” However, the technical challenges are not easy. The forces experienced by the components in future fusion power plants will be enormous. To address these challenges, the company has been working with experts from CERN for more than a year to test whether new stainless-steel grades can withstand these extreme loads. This collaboration has now been extended for another two years to test further candidate materials.
CERN is one of the largest and most renowned institutes for basic research in fundamental physics in the world. Here, researchers search for the fundamental laws of the universe. To design, build and maintain the infrastructure needed to perform its unique experiments, CERN has a number of the world's best experts in the field of materials science. The stainless steel produced by Rolf Kind GmbH can be tested at the laboratories at CERN at temperatures as low as 4K or -269°C. The superconducting magnets of the fusion power plants will later work with liquid helium at precisely this temperature.
"Our collaboration with CERN means working with one of the world's most modern laboratories alongside experts with a wealth of expertise to find the right steel for the requirements of the fusion power plants of tomorrow," explains Markus Kind. "We have the technical expertise in material selection and forging technology and at CERN the material can be tested exactly according to our specifications."
"Mechanical characterization at cryogenic temperatures has been essential for the construction of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). A large amount of high strength structural materials were qualified through thousands of tests at cryogenic temperature”, says Stefano Sgobba, head of the Materials, Metrology and Non-Destructive Testing section of the Mechanical and Materials Engineering group at CERN.
"We are now thrilled that these unique facilities and know-how developed over several decades can contribute, together with Rolf Kind’s expertise in advanced forging technologies, to the future of such a promising energy source as nuclear fusion", says Ignacio Aviles Santillana, responsible of the cryogenic mechanical testing activity of the section.
Rolf Kind GmbH has thus built up a great deal of expertise in recent years. "I believe we can call ourselves justifiably as one of the hidden champions in this field. In the field of highly stressed forgings for fusion machines, we are highly specialized and significantly close to our customers. We are constantly developing our products in line with our customers' requirements - and at an international level", says Markus Kind.
The German government has also recognized the potential of nuclear fusion. It plans to invest one billion euros in fusion research in the coming years, creating the basis for a fusion ecosystem in the industry. "Fusion is a huge opportunity to solve all our energy problems", said Research Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger last summer.
The fact that the employees of Rolf Kind GmbH are also burning for the fusion fire is evident. Mankind's dream of inexhaustible energy - marketable fusion reactors for a stable, environmentally friendly and affordable energy supply - can become reality with forgings from Rolf Kind GmbH in Lindlar. They will definitely be needed.