Eto Oxygen the major gas distributor in Oita Prefecture is concentrating its efforts on selling high-concentration dissolved oxygen generators using fine bubbles to the agricultural/fishery industry and dairy farming as new fields of consumer. Last November Eto established “Dissolution Development Department” which is dedicated for the business, supporting higher value addition to the local food business with fine O2 bubbles.

“Fine Bubbles” stand for the air bubbles of 1μm (1/1000mm) existing in liquids or solids, which are said to give good effects to promote growth in hydroponic or soil culture and are introduced for the agricultural/fishery industry in many cases. There also are a variety of other diverse applications which include cleaning of silicon wafers, waste water treatment and mayonnaise. In July 2012 “Fine Bubble Industrial Society” was established jointly by industries, universities and R&D institutions. Taiyo Nippon Sanso participates from the gas industry. The society is also joined by a variety of enterprises including Shimadzu, Horiba, Sharp, Shiseido, Kewpie and Kubota.

Positioning the fine bubble technology to be a promising field, the government has started to take it up for international standardization. Last year the government implemented verification of metabolic stimulation effects to living substances and antiseptic effects to micro-organisms with a budget of 200 million JPY under the title of “Basic R&D Project of Fine Bubbles.” That means the technology is worth drawing keen attention.

In the midst of the trend Eto Oxygen was aiming to develop a water treatment system applying the fine bubble technology to every field, and started to make out a production system of “Fine Bubble Water” using PSA with S.E. Alex of its group company two years ago.

After collecting data on the effects of dissolved oxygen water with farmers and fishery companies, Eto developed a high-concentration dissolved oxygen generator named “Puku Puku Fine.” Consisting of an oxygen concentrator using the PSA method, a fine bubble generator, a pump and so on, the system highly concentrates oxygen in air and dissolve it directly into water. Hironori Sato of Dissolution Development Dept. manager emphasized that their technology in the gas field fostered for years is working actively now in the product.

Fine bubbles come into being by generation of high-concentration oxygen gas of about 90% at an oxygen flowrate of 6 liter per minute of the system. It is characteristic that fine bubbles can stay existing for long hours at 4 years/1m without any influence of floating force while the ordinary air bubbles (1mm) float up at a speed of 2 seconds/1m. The production of the system is carried out by Eto Manufacturing.