The demonstration project on fuel cells and energy networks of electricity, heat, and hydrogen in an existing apartment building has been initiated to evaluate authors’ proposal. The authors proposed the setting up of an energy system by fuel cells and energy networks of electricity, hot water, and hydrogen in residential areas. The apartments building has hydrogen production facilities on the roof and hydrogen is available as basic infrastructure. Six apartment houses are involved and three PEM fuel cells (700 W) with hot water storage tanks have been installed, and the electricity and hot water from the fuel cells are shared via an internal electricity grid and a hot water network. The operation results including the performance of each system component such as fuel cell are reported.

From processed fats and oils to various detergents which are essential to our daily life, hydrogen is widely utilized to produce oleochemical products. A typical example of hydrogenation in the oleochemical industries is the hardening of animal fats or vegetable oils. They are hydrogenated for improvement of thier quality including oxidation stability and control of the melting point. On the other hand, a large amount of hydrogen is consumed for fatty alcohol production. Here high pressure condition of more than 20MPa is used. The manufacturing process has been advanced with the technology to handle safely high pressure hydrogenation and development of hydrogenation catalyst with high performance. This report introduces a summary of hydrogen utilization in the oleochemical industries.

Polysilicon is a raw material of the semiconductor devices. It is converted to the single-crystal silicon and then the silicon wafer as a silicon substrate of LSI chip. Recently, the photovoltaic cell is paid to attention as the energy without generating carbon dioxide with the worldwide movement of the global environment protection. Polysilicon is also used as a raw material of the silicon type- photovoltaic cell.

High pure hydrogen is one of the key materials for production of Polysilicon. Then, in this text, the main process of manufacturing Polysilicon for the semiconductor and the situation of the attempt of low-cost Polysilicon production for the photovoltaic cell are reviewed with the matter of the high pure hydrogen as a reducing agent and dilution.

According to the statistics document which the Plastic Waste Management Institute published, the amount of waste plastics in Japan of 2006 is about 10,050,000 t. 72% of the waste plastics are used effectively. The waste plastics which are not used effectively is 28% (direct incineration or direct landfill). With a surge of the interest to environment such as the prevention of global warming, the effective utilization rate of the waste plastic rises year by year, but improvement of the further effective utilization rate and development of eco-friendly recycling technology are still important to push forward construction of the recycling society. The Containers and Packing Recycling Law was completely enforced in 2000 to aim at the construction of the recycling society. In environment change to surround such a waste plastic, Showa Denko used the gasification technology that was chemical recycling and started a business to produce ammonia as raw materials with a syn-gas provided by a gasification of the waste plastic from 2003.

The petroleum industry has been producing and consuming a lot of hydrogen in refineries for years. It consumes as much as 70% of all hydrogen in Japan and would provide 4.7 billion Nm³ per year. In refineries, hydrogen is produced in the Hydrogen Production Unit (HPU) and catalytic reformer, and it is consumed in the hydrotreatment process, hydrorefining and hydrocracking unit. In this report, I’ll briefly outline hydrogen production and utilization in refineries.

To compare the experimental data of the membrane reactors with results of simulation, two types of hydrogen-permselective membranes, ZrO₂/SiO₂ composite membrane and Pd membrane, were prepared and installed in a reactor for methane steam reforming, respectively. Hydrogen permeation mechanisms through ZrO₂/SiO₂ composite membrane indicated Knudsen diffusion and that through Pd membrane indicated solution diffusion transport. Comparison with the experimental and simulation data showed a good agreement. The results of numerical analysis based on the obtained exergy of product and the total exergy supplied in the reaction system showed that the exergy loss of hydrogen production using a hydrogen-permselective membrane reactor for methane steam reforming process at the lowest was 30-50% less than that of a conventional process.

Zirconium-based compounds prepared by an R.F. reactive sputtering method using Zr target under Ar+0₂+N₂ atmosphere with heating a substrate were evaluated as a non-platinum cathode for polymer electrolyte fuel cells. The effect of the substrate temperature and the gas atmosphere during the film formation on the catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and the characteristics of the films were investigated. The catalytic activity for the ORR increased with the increasing substrate temperature. The ZrO_xN_y prepared at P_Ar=0.886 Pa, P_N2=0.41Pa, and P_O2=1.7m Pa with a substrate temperature of 800°C had a superior catalytic activity for the ORR. The onset potential for the ORR had a maximum of 0.8 V vs. RHE. Thin film XRD analysis revealed that the ZrO_xN_y with a high catalytic activity for the ORR contained the Zr₂ON₂ crystalline structure.

Today, there are two different major biofuels for transportation. One substitute for gasoline is ethanol produced from starch and sugar derived from corn, sugar cane, and so on. Another substitute for diesel fuel is BDF (bio-diesel fuel) produced through transesterification of vegetable oils such as rapeseed oil and soybean oil. Conventional biofuels use food crops, threatening food supplies as the world population is rising. In contrast, the second generation biofuels will be produced from non-food feedstocks of lignocellulose and so on, for which a number of conversion processes are under development. On the other hand, butanol as a new biofuel is proposed by BP and DMF (2,5-dimethylfuran) is also developed by the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Boeing is developing a new bio-jet fuel with a heat value similar to conventional jet fuels. This bio-jet fuel is not produced through transesterification, but through hydrotreatment of biomass. Recent trends in conversion technologies and new biofuels are reviewed.

In addition, greenhouse gases from life cycle of bio-fuels as well as current environmental issues are also briefly mentioned.

Hydrogen behavior in air is still mysterious when it’s emitted or leaked from orifice. Hydrogen might diffuse quickly and reach to the level lower than lower explosion (LEL) limit immediately. Hydrogen molecules diffuse quickly as individual or form clusters with others. But if there is obstacle to diffuse hydrogen, it might stay at the rather high concentration under the ceiling as a cloud. Real time and direct analysis hydrogen sensor in pin point 3-D monitoring was challenged by electron impact ionization with direct sampling system(Direct analysis).

In ion sensor, sample gas was introduced from sniffer probe through narrow silica capillary tubing with nonpolar inner treatment. Water absorption and adsorption on the surfaces in sensor system was prevented by applying chemical treatment on metal surfaces and heating. Then hydrogen sample was directly injected to differential pumping stages to ion detector through ionization cell. Output signal kept linear relation in hydrogen concentration of 0.1-100% range. Repeatability and long term stability experiments were also performed and showed excellent stability.

Several hydrogen sensors were tested by hydrogen emission. The results at initial sampling start and final sampling stop performance after cut introducing hydrogen were compared. In 3 dimensional hydrogen emission and combustion test, the H2 concentrations were checked in real time and direct analysis.