The industrial production of technical ceramics is associated with very high energy consumption. In the face of advancing climate change and increasing resource problems, it is therefore also important to switch to alternative energies or to further develop potential savings in a more targeted way.

The aim is to develop cost-effective strategies that increase energy efficiency and reduce carbon and greenhouse gas emissions, thereby significantly improving the environmental footprint and economic efficiency of ceramic production in general. Approaches such as using hydrogen as a fuel or electrically operated kilns are already in use but have proved inferior to established firing systems from an economic and quality point of view. A promising approach to optimizing ceramic production from both an environmental and economic perspective is using a gas-fired kiln supported by electric heating elements. In this way, the advantages of both technologies can be maximized, and the disadvantages minimized. A major disadvantage of gas-fired kilns is that during the sintering phase (900-1700 °C), the hot exhaust gases are hardly used and are released into the environment via the chimney. If the heating process during the sintering phase utilized electric heating elements, the waste gas losses would be virtually zero. Heat transfer during the sintering phase is mainly by thermal radiation, while convection, such as that produced by a gas burner, has a decreasing effect since thermal radiation only occurs at high temperatures above about 1000 °C, as illustrated by the definition of heat exchange between two bodies.