2020 年 41 巻 3 号 p. 108-114
In this paper, a literature survey and an evaluation of the technological potential of electrification in industrial sectors in Japan were conducted. The ten largest energy-consuming sectors were selected and their electricity consumption was estimated assuming that electrification technologies are installed on a large scale. The estimation reveals that electricity consumption can increase by 93 TWh in total, mainly due to the wide diffusion of heat pumps in the production process, replacing the current boiler usage. This implies that there is considerable potential for heat pump technologies that are already practically implemented. It has also been demonstrated that there is potential to increase consumption by 646TWh through the use of direct and indirect electrification in a wide range of industries, including the iron and steel, and chemical industries.