Panasonic and Tokyo Gas through their joint development have released a new model of their “Ene-Farm” home fuel cell, offering a rate generation efficiency of 40%(LHV), the highest in the world to date. The new Ene-Farm fuel cell co-generation systems generate electricity through a chemical reaction between oxygen in the atmosphere and hydrogen extracted from city gas. The generated heat as result of this process is also used for heating home and hot water supply. Due to the fact that electricity is generated and used in the same place, there are no transmission losses, and the heat produced during electricity generation can be then used without any waste.
The fuel cell system allows primary energy consumption to be reduced by approximately 35% and CO2 emission by around 48%, allowing users to cut on their utility bills by as much as 50,000 to 60,000 JPY annually, and CO2 emission by approximately 1.5 tons a year. The Ene-Farm home fuel cell does not come cheap, the system price tag is 2,761,500 JPY including TAX, but even with this price, it beats the price of its predecessor by 700,000 JPY. The new “Ene-Farm” home fuel cell will be sold by Tokyo Gas from April 1, 2011
