COPENHAGEN, DENMARK: Last week, at the CopenMind exhibition in Copenhagen, the latest research into Clean Technology was exhibited. Some of the research from Asia included using waste produced by the electronics industry to convert wasted heat into electricity, using hydrogen energy in agriculture, plans for cheap solar energy and more.

The three universities from Japan were Tokyo University of Science, Tokai University and Tokyo Institute of Technology.

Here are summarises some of the interesting research presented by Japanese universities, including:

* Using waste produced by the electronics industry to convert wasted heat into electricity, an application which can be used in petrol and diesel cars, which waste about 70 percent of heat generated in the engine and exhausts.

* The case of Saijo city which is making use of their groundwater and hydrogen technology to boost their local agriculture economy without polluting their valuable water resource

* Technology which reduces the cost of solar energy to 8 US cents/KWh.

Silicon waste to electricity
The electronics industry produces silicon sludge as waste. In the process of silicon wafer fabrication, about 60 percent of the initial silicon source is discarded as silicon sludge. Even solar cell fabrication produces silicon sludge waste.

Associate Prof. Iida and his team from Tokyo University of Science have developed a technology, which converts silicon sludge into magnesium silicide (Mg2Si), a material, which traps wasted heat energy and converts it into electricity.

One possible use for this technology is in diesel or petrol cars which wastes about 70 percent of heat generated in the engine and exhausts.

Commercial scale low-cost concentrating solar power
Solar energy generation is expensive. Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech) scientists have plans to bring the cost of solar power generation down to 8 or 9 US cents/KWh. They have vastly improved the beam down solar thermal system.

A 100 kW pilot plant is scheduled to be operating in Abu Dhabi in June 2009 in view of the next step, namely a 20 MW demonstration plant construction. Tokyo Tech scientists are now in the process of improving technological difficulties faced by the beam down system by developing multi-ring central reflectors, molten salt receiver, intelligent heliostat and more, which greatly reduces the cost of the system.

Hydrogen energy and sustainable development
The treasured resource of Saijo City in Western Japan is its clean mineral water from their underground springs. In fact it is one of the best 100 drinking mineral water sources in Japan. Like most cities, Saijo City would like to be self sufficient, rejuvenate local businesses and increase its food production. However, they want to do this without adding stress on the natural environment.

To achieve its sustainable development goal, Saijo City collaborated with Prof. Uchida and his team from Tokai University to make use of new clean hydrogen technology while utilising their treasured resource, water. This resulted in the Metal Hydride (MH) freezer system which was tested on their strawberry industry in 2007.

The system makes use of wasted heat from a nearby steel factory and water from the underground spring to produce cooling water (below 278K) for the strawberries. The MH system is clean without CFC or ammonia gas and consumes 30 percent less energy than conventional Freon gas type freezers. It uses hydrogen and hydrogen storage alloys and can make use of high temperature wasted heat from industry or incinerators and low temperature sources like groundwater, rivers or the ocean but does not contaminate the water source.