Risk hedging against the fuel price fluctuation in energy service business

Energy service business, or energy service company (ESCO), is expanding among industrial users as a means of energy saving. The ESCO business normally tends to become a long-term operation. During the operation, fluctuations of fuel and electricity costs significantly impact on the stability of the profit from ESCO business. Therefore, it is essential to reduce the risk of fuel and electricity cost fluctuations. Generally, a transaction called “financial derivative” is used as a measure of hedging against the fuel price fluctuation. In the case of ESCO business, it is necessary to manage the risk of both electricity and fuel price fluctuations because the variation in electricity price strongly affects the profit from ESCO as that in fuel price does.     

Visible-light photocatalytic activity of TiO2−x by heat treatment and plasma-heat treatment

The partial reduction of TiO₂ was attempted by heat treatment and plasma-heat treatment and it was carried out to investigate the photocatalytic characteristics of partially reduced TiO₂ (TiO_2?x) in the visible-light region. As a result, the plasma-heat treatment shows significantly stronger than the heat treatment for the visible-light photocatalytic activity of TiO₂. The red-shifted absorption bands in the visible-light region of TiO_2?x by plasma-heat treatment gave broader than one by heat treatment. The TiO_2?x by heat treatment and plasma-heat treatment was changed white to beige color, and white to navy, respectively.     

Automated single nucleotide polymorphism typing using bead array in capillary tube

A low-cost and simple on-site technique for genotyping single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) was developed. The technique is based on allele-specific primer PCR and the recently developed bead arrays in a single tip technique. The performance of the method was verified by genotyping four SNPs that correlate with cardiovascular diseases.     

Interaction of π-bonds of the silicon–silicon triple bond with alkali metals: An isolable anion radical upon reduction of a disilyne

The reduction of 1,1,4,4-tetrakis[bis(trimethylsilyl)methyl]-1,4-diisopropyltetrasila-2-yne 1 with an equivalent amount of alkali metal (Li, Na, K, KC₈) in THF produced the corresponding disilyne anion radicals 2a–c. Their EPR spectra are independent of the metals used in THF, indicating that the disilyne anion radical species exists as solvent-separated ion pairs in polar solvents. The one-electron reduction also occurred with potassium in toluene to produce the potassium salt of the anion radical 3, which was isolated as extremely air- and moisture-sensitive dark brown crystals. The molecular structure of 3 was established by X-ray crystallography, which showed that the potassium ion is solvated by one toluene molecule. The EPR spectrum of 3 in toluene showed the interaction of the anionic silicon atom with the K⁺ ion.     

Control of carbon incorporation in AlAs grown by atomic layer epitaxy using variously orientated substrates

We demonstrate a method for successfully controlling carbon incorporation in AlAs layers grown by atomic layer epitaxy (ALE) using various GaAs substrates with different orientations. The number of alkyl radicals attached to an Al atom at the surface, which is a main factor in carbon incorporation, can be intentionally controlled by changing substrate orientation. We found that the carbon incorporation in ALE-AlAs using the (3 1 1)B surface is 2 x 10¹⁷,cm^-3, which is the lowest value ever reported for ALE-AlAs that satisfies one-monolayer self-limiting growth conditions.     

Pb-free surface-finishing on electronic components’ terminals for Pb-free soldering assembly

Pb-free solderable surface finishing is essential to implement Pb-free solder assembly in order to meet with the growing demand of environmental consciousness to eliminate Pb from electronic products. Two types of widely applicable Pb-free surface finishing technologies are developed. One is the multilayer-system including Pd with Ni undercoat. Heat-resistance of Pd enables whole-surface-plating on to leadframe before IC-assembling process. The other is the double-layer-system with low-melting-point-materials, for example, thicker Sn underlayer and thinner Sn-Bi alloy overlayer, dilutes Sn-Bi alloy’s defects of harmful reactivity along with substrate metal and mechanical brittleness with keeping its advantages of solder-wettability and no whisker.     

Proposal and development of radial air‐gap coreless generator suitable for small wind turbine used in urban area

Independent distributed power generation using small wind turbines is becoming more widespread as wind power generation increases. Installation of small wind turbines in densely populated urban areas is not only useful from the viewpoint of extracting wind power sources in weak‐wind areas but also for making renewable energy easier to access when power supplies are closer to consumers. It is from this point of view that the authors proposed “urban wind power generation” using a collective system with a number of small vertical wind turbines, and have developed a suitable generator for low‐speed vertical wind turbines such as a Savonius windmill. Based on a standard coreless generator, the proposed generator is designed to make the direction of the magnetic flux radial in order to install the magnets and coils on the outer end of the generator. The change of magnet composition and flux direction maximizes the speed of the flux change and output voltage within a limited space. With the above configuration, the power of the proposed generator is independent of the diameter. In this report, the authors describe and evaluate the fundamental performance of a prototype of the proposed generator. Based on the experiments, a maximum output power of 283 W was obtained. The obtained starting torque is small enough to begin rotation under weak wind conditions of no more than 1 m/s. Therefore, it is clear that the proposed “radial” coreless generator is suitable for self‐starting and producing high power at low wind speed. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electr Eng Jpn, 167(1): 26– 34, 2009; Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience.wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/eej.20695     

Programmed High‐Hole‐Mobility Supramolecular Polymers from Disk‐Shaped Molecules

In this paper a simple, casting solution technique for the preparation of two‐dimensional (2D) arrays of very‐high molecular weight (MW) 1D‐Pc supramolecular inorganic polymers is described. The soluble fluoroaluminium tetra‐tert‐butylphthalocyanine (ttbPcAlF) is synthesized and characterized, which can be self‐assembled to form 2D arrays of very‐high‐MW 1D‐Pc supramolecular inorganic polymers. High‐resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) demonstrates that the 1D‐ttbPcAlF, having a cofacial ring spacing of ～0.36 nm and an interchain distance of ～1.7 nm, self‐assembles into 2D‐nanosheets (～140 nm in length, ～20 nm in width, and equivalent to MW of 3.2 × 10⁵ g mol^?1). The film cast from a 1,2‐dichloroethane (DCE) solution shows a minimum hole‐mobility of ～0.3 cm² V^?1 s^?1 at room temperature by flash‐photolysis time‐resolved microwave conductivity (TRMC) measurements and a fairly high dark dc‐conductivity of ～1 × 10^?3 S cm^?1.