Hitachi, Ltd.

Hideaki Kurokawa

Katsuya Ebara

Sankichi Takahashi

Yasuo Koseki

Akira Yamada

Harumi Matsuzaki

Hiroaki Yoda

Yukio Hishinuma

Nobuatsu Hayashi

Isao Ohkouchi

Osamu Kuroda

Naohiro Momma

Shigeo Sugimoto

Akira Ashida

Isao Okouchi

Takahisa Nitta

Kenji Mitani

Risuke Onoda

Isao Kouchi

A distillation apparatus includes a distillation unit for distilling feed water. The distillation unit includes an evaporation part, a condensation part and a hydrophobic porous membrane interposed between the evaporation part and the condensation part, which are integrated with one another. A heating unit for heating the feed water and a cooling portion for cooling distillate produced by distillation of the feed water are provided apart from the distillation unit. One or both of the heating unit and the cooling unit are provided with a heat pump. With this construction, an additional heater does not need to be provided, and the distillation unit and both of the heating unit and the cooling unit can be changed in size and performance independently of each other, so that the overall size of the distillation apparatus can be reduced.

Distillation apparatus with porous membrane and heat pump

Vapor is separated from mist accompanying the vapor by passing the vapor through a porous membrane. The vapor having passed through the membrane is brought into contact with an object to be washed and condenses thereon, whereby the object is washed.

Vapor washing process and apparatus

A cooling energy generator with a cooling energy accumulator comprises a refrigerant, absorbent liquid, and a container having a first chamber receiving the absorbent liquid, a second chamber receiving the liquid refrigerant and a vapor passage communicating with a space over the absorbent liquid in the first chamber and with a space over the liquid refrigerant in the second chamber. The absorbent liquid is sprayed in the first chamber, and the absorbent liquid is cooled during an accelerated cooling operation. The absorbent liquid is heated during the cooling energy accumulation operation, and liquid refrigerant is sprayed in the second chamber during the accelerated cooling operation and during the normal cooling operation. An air conditioning heat exchanger supplies the cooling energy to a cooling device for air conditioning, and a heat pump is provided. The cooling energy generator with the cooling energy accumulator continues to generate cooling energy for normal air cooling without any additional device even when the refrigerant is not absorbed by the absorbent because the refrigerant is circulated in the second chamber to generate the normal cooling energy.

Cooling energy generator with cooling energy accumulator

A coldness generating apparatus comprising: an absorption type refrigerator having an evaporator for evaporating refrigerant, an absorber in which an absorbent for absorbing the thus-evaporated refrigerant steam is contained, a regenerator for heating and condensing the absorbent which has been diluted by the refrigerant steam, and a condenser for condensing and liquidizing the refrigerant steam which has been evaporated by heating and condensing the absorbent. A regenerating tank regenerates coldness generated by the evaporator, and the refrigerant comprises refrigerant having the solidification temperature lower than the freezing point so that coldness which is lower than the freezing point and which has been generated in the evaporator is regenerated in the form of ice or ice slurry. Since coldness can be regenerated at high density, cooling performance can be improved.

Apparatus and method of generating coldness

A distilling apparatus includes an evaporation section which heats raw water and causes the generation of vapor from said raw water, and a hydrophobic porous film through which the thus generated vapor is filtered. Because vapor separated from the raw water is supplied to one surface of the hydrophobic porous film, the proportion of the vapor relative to the fluid supplied to that surface of the film can be increased, thereby enabling the efficient filtering of a large amount of vapor through the film. In addition, because the temperature of condensed water obtained by cooling the vapor can be kept in the vicinity of the boiling point thereof, any gases and volatile substances contained in the raw water are prevented from dissolving in the distilled water, thereby enabling the production of extremely pure distilled water.

Distilling apparatus

The present invention relates to a process for producing ultra-pure water, an apparatus for producing said ultra-pure water and a process for using the ultra-pure water produced according to said process. More particularly, the present invention relates to a process for producing ultra-pure water which comprises boiling a raw water to vaporize off the volatile components from the raw water, subsequently generating steam from the water, contacting the steam with a hydrophobic, porous, gas-permeable and liquid-impermeable membrane to make the steam permeate the membrane, and then condensing the steam, as well as to an apparatus for producing said ultra-pure water and a process for using said ultra-pure water.

Process for producing ultra-pure water and process for using said

An absorbent in a solution which comprises at least one of bromides taking a dihydrate form at room temperature and at least one of halides taking a hexahydrate form at room temperature has a high solubility and a low cost, and is used in a closed, cyclic absorption-type refrigerator.

Absorption-type refrigerator

The method and apparatus for concentration aqueous solution in accordance with the present invention is characterized in that a hydrophobic porous membrane through which vapor can permeate, but not liquid, is brought into contact with an aqueous solution containing a solute at a concentration of at least 30%, and the water contained in the aqueous solution at the interface with the membrane is evaporated and permeates through the membrane. A method and an apparatus of recovering temperature of an aqueous solution comprising an aqueous solution concentration step in which the aqueous solution contact with the membrane, the water being evaporated; and a dilution step in which the resultant concentrated solution is diluted; wherein a temperature is obtained higher or lower than that of said aqueous solution. The method and apparatus for concentrating an aqueous solution can be used as a means or apparatus for concentrating an aqueous solution in a dilution type of heat pump, an absorption type of heat pump or an absorption type of refrigerator. Aqueous solutions for high-temperature outputs of dilution systems include aqueous solutions of sulfuric acid, nitric acid, etc., and for low-temperature outputs include aqueous solutions of potassium nitrate, sodium nitrate, etc. and further for absorption systems include aqueous solutions of NaClO.sub.3, lithium bromide, etc.

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Hitachi, Japan

Hideaki Kurokawa