Yamaguchi Liquid Hydrogen (JV of Iwatani and Tokuyama) completed the expansion of capacity to produce liquid hydrogen which had been in progress since long time ago. On December 18, 2017, a completion ceremony was held and the expanded plant was put in operation. 　　

Yamaguchi Liquid Hydrogen invested 65% by Iwatani and 35% by Tokuyama was established in June 2013 as a company to produce liquid hydrogen using the crude hydrogen which comes out of the production process of caustic soda at Tokuyama’s Tokuyama Plant. Therefore, all facilities for liquefaction are equipped inside the premises of Tokuyama’s Tokuyama Plant.

As the plant has been operated as the main supply source of liquid hydrogen for a rocket fuel delivered to Tanegashima Space Center having rocket launching pads, to which the plant is nearest of Iwatani’s three liquid hydrogen plant possessed by the Iwatani Group.

From the beginning of operation in June 2013, a spacious layout was provided in anticipation of the future expansion of production capacity. However, much further expansion has turned out be needed not only for the full-fledged development of H3 rocket using new liquid fuel, but also the uprising boom of demand for hydrogen energy represented by FCV. Judging from the situation, the expansion of capacity was decided and put into construction from July 2016 and has just been completed.

The expansion plan was intended to double the existing capacity adding one more line to the single processing line of liquid hydrogen production.

To this end, the investment in the compressor, PSA, recycling compressor and hydrogen liquefier necessary for liquefaction was implemented so that they can be installed having the same capacity right beside the existing facilities.

However, as for liquid nitrogen used for heat exchange by liquefier, a re-liquefying facility has been newly installed because the allocation frequency of tank trucks cannot be doubled to follow the doubled output capacity of LH2, although hydrogen has so far been delivered by tank trucks to the container of N2 attached alongside. The total cost of the expansion at this time amounted to about 4 billion.

With this investment Yamaguchi Liquid Hydrogen attained a production capacity of 3,000ℓ/h x 2 which is equivalent to 40million m3 per year. For reference Iwatani’s production capacity totaling the above-mentioned three bases has reached 100 million m3.

Yutaka Yamamoto president of Yamaguchi Liquid Hydrogen and Iwatani’s director in charge of hydrogen disclosed his policy saying, “The size of domestic market of commercial hydrogen is somewhere around 150 million m3 per year, but it is forecast to be doubled in 2025. We are also planning to enlarge the production capacity of Hydro Edge (Sakai, Osaka) in 2019. As regards a new plant, we intend to proceed with planning for a region east of Nagoya in the future keeping an eye on the trend of demand.”