- © 2024, CPERI – Chemical Process & Energy Resources Institute
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The Institute is structured in Laboratories, serving as basic functional business units, representing a distinct cost center, and Research Groups.
CPERI’s Director leads all the Institute units with the support of the administrative, financial and the IT department and is a member of the CERTH’s Board of Directors. In the exercise of responsibilities and duties, the Director is assisted by the Scientific Council of the Institute.
The CPERI Administration has a coordinating role in communication between the Institute Laboratories and the Research Groups and the central services of the CERTH.
The Analytical Services Unit is a horizontal structure of the Institute in which all researchers have access to the services.
According to the legislation, the Scientific Council of CPERI consists of seven members with a term of two years. Scientific Councils meet obligatorily once a month and exceptionally either after the Director’s proposal, or the majority of its members or after the proposal of the 1/5 of the research staff of the Institute. The council assists the Director of the Institute in the exercise of its responsibilities, monitors the research and development program of the Institute and submits its opinion and criticism to the Director of the Institute and to the Board of Directors of the research center. In addition, it contributes to the Institute’s strategy, to the organizational chart and to the human resources policy, whereas it supports the Director of the Institute in the drafting of opinions on specific questions submitted to the Board of Directors Council. Finally, it evaluates the research work of the Institute in relation to the ESETAK, appoints the judging and the advisory committees for new Researcher and Special Functional Scientists positions.
On December 2020 till today, new elected members of the Scientific Council are:
CPERI is equipped with state-of-the-art laboratory instruments and pilot units dedicated to supporting research in all the scientific areas. The acquisition of national institutional projects achieves continuous upgrade and modernisation of the existing infrastructure and instrumentation.
From the beginning of 2018, new laboratory facilities related to the scientific direction of energy and environment in Lakomma, Chalkidiki, have been added to the CPERI.
Very recently, in November 2021, a new building in the central premises of CPERI was donated by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, the ENERGO/The Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) Hub for the Research and Adoption of Sustainable Energy Sources, has been delivered to CPERI. As it is self-evident by its title, the ENERGO will focus on clean energy and, more specifically, on the area of clean automotive powertrain technologies for Green Mobility and, according to its operational plan, can accommodate about 100 researchers.
Also, within 2021, the second phase of the Ptolemaida branch’s facilities expansion has been completed, doubling the research potential for laboratories and researchers that can be accommodated. Meanwhile, the procedures for the approval of the budget for the construction of the third phase have begun.
Finally, funding by the European Investment Bank (EIB) has been approved to construct two new building facilities, of a total area of 4000 m2, the one in the Thess Intec technology park and the other in the existing premises of the site of Lakomma. The new infrastructure will support basic and applied research activities to develop innovative technologies for the production of products and services with the vision of achieving technological excellence in its fields.
The Research infrastructure include, among others, computer software, measuring instruments and analytical devices, independent laboratory and pilot units, etc. The Director of the Institute is responsible for their smooth operation and proper access. A Register of Research Infrastructures is kept, compiled and updated on an annual basis. The Equipment Manager is the Scientific Responsible of the project from which the equipment was purchased and / or depreciated.
| Short description | |
|---|---|
| Software | ASPEN, DYMOLA, SIMAPRO: Process simulation, LCA/LCC |
| ANSYS Fluent Computational and Mechanical: Fluid dynamics & mechanical stress analysis | |
| MedeA/VASP DFT: Molecular level computational physico-chemistry | |
| Computing infrastructure | MedeA supercomputer. |
| High Performance Computing Center (HPC): 580 cores with a total memory of 2 TB for faster data transmission and increase of parallel processing efficiency | |
| Hypatia Elixir: server, 96 cores, 987 GB, database server, 8 cores, 16 GB | |
| Material characterisation (solids) | XRF, XRD, FTIR/Raman, X-ray Tomographer, SEM, TEM, EPR spectroscopy, Mercury Porosimeter, TGA/DSC, Elemental analysis (CHN), Temperature-programmed methods: (Reduction, oxidation, desorption) TPR-H2, TPO, TPD-NH3, TPD-CO2, TPD-He, Atomic absorption graphite spectrometer & furnace |
| Automatic unit for measuring classical and specific electric and magnetic material properties as a function of frequency and temperatures | |
| Material characterisation (liquid and gases) | Gas chromatography / mass spectrometry system (GC-MS), GC/ECD/NPD, GC/FID/TCD/TCD, MicroGC-Biogas analyzer, Ion Chromatograph (IC), TOC/TN, HPLC, Permporometry measurement unit |
| Material characterisation (polymer) | High temperature gel permeation chromatography (GPC), GPC/HPLC/RID/ UV-Vis/DAD, Differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) |
| Fuel analysis & characterisation | Portable Professional fuel gas analyzer |
| Fully equipped laboratory for characterization of fuels – biofuels | |
| ISO17025 certified lab for solid fuel analyses: Biomass and other fuel analyses (ISO certified) & Biomass preparation unit (crusher, mill, pelletiser) | |
| Liquid fuels adsorptive desulfurisation unit (lab- and pilot-scale) | |
| Ash Fusion Determinator | |
| Microwave digester | |
| Fixed Bed Gasifier | |
| VLE/ VLLE units | Bench-scale units for vapour-liquid and vapour-liquid-liquid equilibrium measurments |
| Set up for synthesis of catalytic materials | Rotary evaporator, oven, calcination furnaces, spray impregnator, spray dryer, etc |
| Ceramic materials synthesis and shaping Infrastructure | Aerosol-based, liquid-phase, solid state synthesis, Nanoparticle & nanostructured materials synthesis reactors and coating |
| Shaping into structures (particles, bodies) | Extruder, press, templating, particles formation via centrifugation, |
| Processing | milling, grinding, granulating, furnaces |
| 3D printing | 3D printers (for ceramics & plastics/polymers |
| Pelleting Press | Pelleting Press for small scale applications, capacity:100kg/h pellets |
| Pellet test equipment | Pellet test equipment for manual control of the pellet quality |
| Mobile Air Quality Monitor system (AQMS) | Measures air pollutants and PM2.5 and PM10. Study the emissions and dispersion of pollutants in specific applications |
| (UAV) – drone | Unmanned Aircraft (UAV) – Drone UAV. Suitable for the characterization of ambient air quality. |
| Metreolological stations | Data recording towards energy demand forecasting |
| DeNOx/DeSOx Unit. | Fixed- and a fluidized-bed reactor. Abatement of gaseous pollutants from various flue gases. |
| Emission control |
|
| Foam Burner | Fully automated lab/pilot-scale porous burner unit for monitoring full wall temperature profile at specified fuel-lean gas compositions |
| EDR | Electrodialysis/ Reverse elecrtodialysis pilot unit |
| Setup for the modification (CVD/CVI/ALD) of ceramic membranes at lab- to pre-pilot scale | Development of ceramic membrane-based modules, from scaling-up to pre-pilot scale, for gas separation applications |
| Gas-liquid membrane contactor unit | Lab-scale gas-liquid membrane contactor unit able to accommodate hollow fiber modules of various membrane materials (ceramic/polymeric/metallic) |
| Setup for the evaluation of polymeric membranes as gas-liquid contactors | Evaluation of polymeric membrane modules for the capture of CO2 and abatement of gaseous pollutants |
| Bioreactors Substrate characterization for biogas production | Continuous operation and complete mixing for Anaerobic and Aerobic Digestion 5 lt and 30lt |
| Bench and pilot-scale membrane units (in-house construction) |
|
| Biological laboratory | Cell exposure and study of biological impact of nanoparticles. Evaluation of the size-specific biological effects of nanoparticles |
| Solar thermochemistry |
|
| Reactor setups & associated peripherals for medium to high temperature thermochemical applications | Reactors heated by electrical furnaces equipped with gas mixture generation, sensors, data monitoring, control and acquisition systems & conditioning/analyses of gases. Evaluation of materials developed for specific thermochemical processes. |
| Hysolgen Unit | The unit provides the H2 needed in Hydrotreating Units of an Integrated Advanced Production System of 2nd Generation Biofuel and aims at the effective exploitation of solar energy towards hydrogen production using a PEM Electrolyzer |
| FCC Pilot Plant Unit (FCC) | Riser based continuous circulating fluid bed reactor with catalyst regeneration. The unit is used for catalytic cracking of liquid feeds. |
| High pressure hydroprocessing pilot plant for liquid feeds (HDS-1, VB01, VB02,) | Small, medium and pilot scales units |
| Batch distillation unit (HyDis) | The unit is fully automated enables up 40 lt/ batch fractionation via vacuum. |
| Pilot-scale pre-drying unit | max capacity of 300 kg/h |
| Reactor of Torrefaction Pre-treatment of biomass through torrefaction | Pilot plant unit for torrefaction of biomass and waste materials, with capacity of 100 kg/hr |
MINOAN – Smart Sustainable
Energy Conversion and Management
GREEN – Geo-Resources, Energy
& Environmental Management
GrEnEA – Green Energy
& Environmental Applications
LIM – Laboratory
of Inorganic Materials
ARTEMIS – Advanced Renewable
Technologies for Energy & Materials
Integrated Systems
NRRE – Natural Resources
& Renewable Energies
PSDI – Laboratory of Process
Systems Design and Implementation
LPRE – Laboratory of Polymer
Reaction Engineering
NICE – Novel materIals
for Clean Energy Applications
LEFH – Laboratory of Environmental
Fuels/Biofuels and Hydrocarbons
HydPro – Hydroprocessing
BCPL – Biological Computation
& Process Laboratory
LEET – Laboratory of Environmental & Energy Transition technologies
(GrEnEA, Green & Minoan Groups)
