Iwatani jointly with Obayashi of the major constructor is going to engage in the verification to recover the cold heat of liquefied hydrogen which has not been utilized and reuse it as an energy for air-conditioning of buildings.

With the stage of Iwatani’s Research and Development Center and Iwatani Advanced Hydrogen Technology Center, cold heat at minus 253℃ is recycled from the liquefied hydrogen for use inside the R&D facility and by the adjacent hydrogen station, so that it can be utilized for air-conditioning inside or producing cooling water for the related experimental facilities.

Iwatani plans to develop necessary heat exchangers to recover cold heat. Proceeding with the development jointly with Obayashi which was engaged in the construction of the R&D Center Building, Iwatani is going to search for possibilities of using cold heat in various buildings from now on. Liquefied hydrogen which is one of the hydrogen supplying methods on the way for utilization as a clean energy is a liquid which is suitable for a massive transportation and storage system, and it is an extremely cold liquid at a temperature of minus 253℃.

The cold heat of liquefied hydrogen has not been recovered in the past. This attempt is aimed to upgrade further the value of hydrogen energy through an effective utilization of the unused energy. Like the current case of LNG, for instance, it is expected that the cold heat of liquid hydrogen will be used for air separation, the liquefaction of carbon dioxide and the production of frozen food when a great deal of liquid hydrogen is imported from abroad. In addition, there will be more cases of contribution in the field of energy saving using the cold heat of liquid hydrogen following the expansion of supply of liquid hydrogen for hydrogen stations and the fuel cells of pure hydrogen type also in the urban area. Above all, bringing into view the urban use of cold heat, Iwatani has come to verify the use of cold heat first to apply it to Iwatani Research and Development Center and Iwatani Advanced Hydrogen Technology Center. It follows that the Research and Development Center is planning to make greening of electricity for the internal use to procure 100% for itself in the future.

The company aims to utilize an independent energy instead of buying electricity from outside by means of installing solar panels in the premises and some units of pure hydrogen type fuel cells as well as operating an electricity storing system. In addition to such a new electricity generating system, it is indispensable for the company to promote energy-saving inside the premises of the center for goal achievement. The attempt to use cold heat of liquid hydrogen at this time is highly expected as it would contributes to energy saving.