The Chair of Geothermal Energy Systems is also linked to the management of the Fraunhofer Research Institution for Energy Infrastructures and Geothermal Energy (IEG). This results in a large number of joint application and transfer-oriented activities between university and industry-related research at Fraunhofer:

Drilling technology:
The cooperation includes the joint development of micro-drilling methods (also known as micro-turbine drilling, MTD) to explore the inner layer of the earth.
The aim is to advance various industrial applications: Geothermal sources can be better tapped through precise drilling,
to produce clean energy that can be used for heating, cooling and power generation. The technology should help to find and utilize natural hydrogen
and use them. It will also be used to search for deposits containing lithium, a crucial raw material for batteries in electric vehicles and energy storage systems.
and energy storage systems.

Mine water utilization:
The WINZER project serves to supply RUB with heat without fossil fuels.To this end, the mine water in the former Mansfeld and Markgraf mines is heated using solar thermal technology and fed into the district heating network using high-temperature heat pumps. The aim is to see how heat, water and pressure
pressure interact in the mines and how this affects the storage tanks and heat pumps there. This should help to operate the mines better and use them more efficiently.

H2 and CO2 storage:
Researchers at the Chair of GES are involved in the investigation of suitable rocks for the storage and mineralization of CO2 and as hydrogen storage facilities and their integration into the future energy infrastructure. The real laboratory TRUDI of the Fraunhofer IEG in Bochum is available to the chair as a research platform. TRUDI is an experimental space for the integration of energy transition technologies into the energy infrastructure of a large city.
One special feature is that we can use the legacy of mining in the Ruhr region for the energy industry. Thanks to an official permit, experiments on the geothermal use of the subsurface can be applied for and carried out in a 7 km2 region called “future energy”. Among other things, we are jointly investigating district heating transformation by integrating large heat pumps using the example of the FUW district heating network Bochum-Süd (capacity approx. 105 MWth) to supply heat to the RUB, Bochum University and Hustadt. We are also researching technologies for storing heat and using mine water and developing geothermal systems for different depths.