Startups and companies contribute to the innovative exhibits on Campus Germany at Expo 2020

“This is a very successful exhibition and we are very impressed with the pavilion as a whole. We are very satisfied with the curated content on the topic of sustainability, â€said Dietmar Schmitz, General Commissioner of the German Pavilion.

“The German Expo appearance is being commissioned by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, which Koelnmesse has commissioned with the organization and implementation of the project. In the three themed areas of the German Pavilion, exciting exhibits are shown that encourage exchange and raise awareness of the importance of sustainability for today and tomorrow. The exhibited German technologies and innovations will leave a lasting impression on the international visitors to Campus Germany and inspire them to spread the message of sustainability. Videos and display boards will explain the more complex ideas and innovations and visitors can try out the functions of the exhibits themselves, â€Schmitz continues.

Energy laboratory

Visitors to the energy laboratory and the energy terrace learn everything about sustainable power generation, loss-free transmission and alternative forms of storage. An exhibit from the startup Enerkite is breaking new ground in wind energy with kite-based systems that offer a significantly more efficient generation option than conventional wind turbines. Another one supplied by Heliatek is based on the energy generated by the sun. It is an ultra-light, flexible, ultra-thin, organic solar film that can be used for completely new applications beyond the possibilities of conventional solar technology.

In 1987 two German physicists received the Nobel Prize for the development of a ceramic material that conducts loss-free at a temperature of -206 ° C. The AmpaCity exhibit from CEON develops your idea further and shows how it can work in practice and paves the way for a technology that will play a key role in transmission in the energy networks of tomorrow.

Another exhibit made available by the City of Munich in cooperation with the State of Bavaria deals with the sustainable use of geothermal energy, which can be used to generate electricity and heat. The medium-term goal of Munich is to cover its district heating needs primarily from this renewable source and to make its district heating 100 percent climate-neutral.

Another exhibit deals with limestone – an inexpensive material that offers an excellent opportunity to store renewable energies in a particularly sustainable and efficient manner. Researchers from the German Aerospace Center (DLR), which provided the exhibit, have found a way to make the reaction temperature of over 600 ° C controllable.

The StenSea – »Stored Energy in the Sea« project, which is carried out by the Fraunhofer Institute for Energy Economics and Energy System Technology, can also be seen at the exhibition. The exhibit uses a model to show how offshore pumped storage works in the sea and, particularly along the coasts of Europe, Japan and the USA, could deliver up to 1,000 times the current pumped storage capacity on land.

In addition, the German Pavilion will present solutions for an innovative storage system that is intended to compensate for fluctuations in the amount of wind and solar energy fed in. The exhibit, which WEMAG and the APEX Group created in cooperation with the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, is an interactive reaction game. It challenges visitors to put their energy management skills to the test and to actively experience the energy transition with battery and hydrogen storage systems.

Future City Lab and Future City Terrace

In the Future City Lab and on the Future City Terrace, an exhibition with a wide range of ideas from food supply to mobility moves with the rhythm of the cities of tomorrow. Together with its partner SSI SCHAEFER, INFARM presents a future-proof, intelligent, modular farm on which everything grows under perfect conditions – with 95 percent less water, 90 percent less mileage, 95 percent less land and zero chemical pesticides.

Two other exhibits deal with the supply of energy and fresh water. The first shows a color-sensitized concrete material that researchers from the “Building Art Invention†platform at the University of Kassel use as a photovoltaic cell. By using a solar-active, organic liquid such as fruit juice, their invention can transform any building into a solar system.

The other shows that despite the latest technology and high energy consumption in water treatment, traces of drugs, viruses or chemicals remain in the purified water. A process developed by the Technical University of Munich and Berliner Wasserbetriebe will be presented, which uses the power of natural bacteria to reduce these residual pollutants in a targeted and efficient manner.

Two other exhibits in the pavilion illuminate mobility from two very different perspectives. TK Elevator’s “Multi†reinvents the elevator as an urban transport system. Horizontal transport, vertical transport far higher than currently possible, a significantly better utilization of valuable building space and an intelligent control system mean that Multi will revolutionize the planning of the buildings and cities of the future.

In addition, the 7-seater Lilium Jet shows the vision of creating a sustainable and accessible high-speed regional transport service. Lilium’s electric vertical take-off and landing jet offers industry-leading capacity, low noise and high performance.

Another exhibit helps to use carbon dioxide and thus promote a circular economy. A process developed by Covestro and its partners will be presented that makes it possible to replace up to 20 percent of the crude oil used in plastics production with safely bound carbon dioxide.

Biodiversity laboratory and biodiversity terrace

The Biodiversity Lab and Biodiversity Terrace offer visitors a first-hand experience of the riches of the earth. These two areas not only showcase some of the wonders of nature, but also show how nature actually inspires technological innovation. Out of an estimated 10 million species on our planet, only 2 million have actually been described. The Taxamap, the work of Dr. Marin Freiberg from iDiv and the University of Leipzig, shows all currently known terrestrial species. It’s a map of diversity – diversity that we need to protect. It also features the interactive game from BASF Agricultural Solutions on biodiversity in agriculture. The loss of natural habitats is a cause of the global decline in biodiversity and this exhibition shows solutions for modern sustainable agriculture that uses land intelligently. This in turn enables the most resource-efficient yield without using more land for agriculture. The result is better protection of biodiversity without major yield losses.

Another exhibit examines the challenges facing agriculture around the world as a result of climate change. It shows how the Institute for Biosciences and Geosciences (IBG-2) at Forschungszentrum Jülich is using the most modern methods to research, for example, the properties that plants will need in the future in order to withstand increasingly extreme environmental conditions.

UGT’s “EcoUnits†will also be shown, which show that ecosystems – highly complex structures – can be examined under laboratory conditions. Another exhibit from iDiv shows the catastrophic effects of European earthworms on the ecosystems of North America.

The inspiration for Festo’s SmartBird exhibition came from the herring gull. The ultra-light flying robot is characterized by excellent aerodynamics and maximum agility and can take off, fly and land autonomously without the need for an additional drive. Its active articulated torsion drive twists the wings in a targeted manner and provides lift and propulsion. This functional integration enables Festo to reveal the technical secrets of bird flight, which can be experienced in this interactive exhibit. Because biodiversity is such a complex field, the creators of the exhibition in this laboratory mainly opted for gamification and animation to engage visitors in an infotainment experience.

Visitor Journey delivers experiences

In addition to the exhibition content, there are various opportunities for visitors to the German Pavilion to discover new experiences and innovations.

One example is the multimedia presentation in the “Germany by Numbers†section. Students from the Faculty of Media Production at the Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Applied Sciences used their skills to produce informative and entertaining animation sequences and games on the topic of sustainability in Germany. In each of the three laboratories of the German Pavilion there are also immersive soundscapes created by students at the Trossingen University of Music. And sustainability plays a major role in the building itself and its furnishings. For example, the paint that Caparol supplies for the walls of the pavilion is produced just a few kilometers away in the company’s production facility in Dubai. The environmentally friendly paint is odorless, has zero VOC and has a proven antimicrobial property that kills 99.9 percent of viruses and bacteria, including the coronavirus, on all painted surfaces. The furniture for the pavilion is also very environmentally friendly and is manufactured entirely in Germany by SEDUS. It is used, for example, in the VIP lounge, where high-quality Villeroy & Boch tableware made in Germany is also used. Villeroy & Boch also supplies the complete sanitary ware for the pavilion.

In addition, visitors can marvel at the Smart Glass eyrise from Merck, which turns windows into “sun visors†at the push of a button, thus reducing energy consumption for air conditioning.