Press Release

Press Release

Developed a New Technology for Adopting Ionic Liquid in the Humidity Control Agent for the Liquid Based Humidity Controlling Air Conditioning Unit

September 06, 2018
Chubu Electric Power Co.,Inc.
Dyna-Air Co., Ltd.

Chubu Electric Power Co., Inc. (Headquarters: Higashi-ku, Nagoya-shi; President & Director: Satoru Katsuno) and Dyna-Air Co., Ltd.(Headquarters: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; Representative Director & President: Hikoo Miyauchi; hereafter, "Dyna-Air") have developed a new technology (hereafter, "this new technology") that utilizes ionic liquid (Note) as the humidity control agent in the liquid type humidity controlling air conditioning unit for the first time in the world.

The liquid type humidity controlling air conditioning unit can either dehumidify and cool or humidify and warm at the same time. It can filter air efficiently and has been introduced primarily in hospitals and in food factories. The agent is circulated between the outside air processing unit and the regeneration unit where the temperature and concentration is adjusted so that air with the appropriate temperature and humidity can be supplied to the building.

Lithium chloride was used as the humidity controlling agent in existing liquid based humidity controlling air conditioning units, but because its corrodes most generic metals such as iron, other expensive corrosive-resistant metals such as titanium needed to be used in the heat exchanger. The humidity controlling agent's dehumidifying capacity also declines as temperatures rise, and maintaining an acceptable level of humidifying capacity requires massive amounts of agent.

With this new technology, ionic liquid, which will not corrode generic metals such as iron, will replace lithium chloride as the humidity controlling agent. The heat exchanger and the gas-liquid direct contact unit will be placed alternately in layers for the humidity controlling agent to circulate through adjusting its temperature and concentration. This has allowed the humidity control and filtering capacity of the unit to be maintained with a smaller amount of humidity controlling agent.

This technology will significantly reduce the manufacturing and operational costs of the liquid based humidity controlling air conditioner.

Demonstrations tests of liquid based humidity controlling air conditioning units using this new technology will be conducted with Dyna-Air in the lead, aiming for the commercialization of the product in FY2019.

This technology is being developed with the cooperation of Yamaguchi and Saito research laboratories at the Waseda University and Evonik Industries (Headquarters: Essen, Germany; Chairman: Christian Kullmann).

[Characteristics of this Technology]

1. Significant lowering of costs

Using ionic liquid will allow generic metals (iron, stainless steel, aluminum, etc.) to be used in the heat exchanger, reducing the manufacturing costs by more than 20% compared to conventional models.

2. Increased energy efficiency

Reducing the amount of humidity controlling agent used will reduce the power consumption of the pump that circulates the agent by approximately 80% compared to conventional models.

3. Unchanging humidity adjusting capacity and filtering capacity

Performance evaluation tests show that the ionic liquid has the same level of humidity adjusting capacity and filtering capacity as conventionally used lithium chloride.

(Note) Ionic liquid

Compound made solely of ions (cations, anions) that are liquid at room temperature. The various combinations of cationic liquids and anionic liquids have various properties that could be applied as electrolytes in electric batteries and as lubricant.

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