Tokyo Gas and Panasonic have jointly developed a new version of their Ene-Farm home fuel cell. Panasonic manufactures the fuel cell unit and supplies it to Tokyo Gas in combination with a hot water unit and backup heat source produced by Gastar , a subsidiary of Tokyo Gas. The price of the new product will be 1,995,000 yen ($ 22514.00, with the standard backup heat source; including tax; excluding installation fee). This is about 760,000 yen ($8576) less than the recommended retail price of the Ene-Farm model currently on the market, made possible by a reduction in the number of components. The new product also achieved an overall efficiency of 95.0% (LHV) – the world’s highest.
It is the first time that the recommended retail price of an Ene-Farm product in Japan has been less than 2 million yen. Due to a reduction in the size of the equipment; the required installation depth has been decreased from 900 mm to 750 mm. Since the backup heat source has also been separated from the hot water unit, the product can now be even more easily installed in a wider variety of places. Moreover, it marks the first time that an Ene-Farm product in Japan includes a remote control with color display as a standard feature. Since the size of the screen is also larger, the text and graphics are even easier to view.
In double-generating homes that have installed both Ene-Farm and a solar system, the remote control will display information on electrical generation for the entire home including power from the solar panels, and the increase in electricity sold to the power company due to Ene-Farm electrical generation. The new product will be available to the general public in three models, jointly developed by Tokyo Gas and Panasonic from April 1, 2013.
Press Release:
Tokyo Gas Co., Ltd. (President: Tsuyoshi Okamoto; ‘Tokyo Gas’ hereinafter) and Panasonic Corporation (President: Kazuhiro Tsuga; ‘Panasonic’ hereinafter) have jointly developed a new version of their ‘Ene-Farm’ home fuel cell*1. Panasonic manufactures the fuel cell unit and supplies it to Tokyo Gas in combination with a hot water unit*2 and backup heat source*2 produced by Gastar Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Tokyo Gas. The new model will be sold by Tokyo Gas from April 1, 2013.
The price of the new product will be 1,995,000 yen (with the standard backup heat source; including tax; excluding installation fee). This is about 760,000 yen less than the recommended retail price of the “Ene-Farm” model currently on the market, made possible by a reduction in the number of components. The new product also achieved an overall efficiency of 95.0% (LHV)*3 – the world’s highest*4. It is the first time that the recommended retail price of an “Ene-Farm” product in Japan has been less than 2 million yen.
Due to a reduction in the size of the equipment, the required installation depth has been decreased from 900 mm to 750 mm. Since the backup heat source*5 has also been separated from the hot water unit, the product can now be even more easily installed in a wider variety of places. Moreover, it marks the first time that an “Ene-Farm” product in Japan includes a remote control with color display as a standard feature. Since the size of the screen is also larger, the text and graphics are even easier to view.
The new product will be available to the general public in three models, jointly developed by Tokyo Gas and Panasonic.
Since the world’s first ‘Ene-Farm’ products were put on general sale in May 2009, Panasonic has now shipped a total of approx. 21,000 units throughout Japan as of the end of December 2012, of which approx. 15,000 have been sold by Tokyo Gas. For FY2013, Panasonic will complete a production setup to enable an annual production capacity 50% greater than its current annual production forecast to more than 15,000 units*6, while Tokyo Gas will aim for annual sales of 7,100 units – 70% more than the FY2012 sales target of 12,000 units.
Through the spread of these “Ene-Farm” products, the two companies will contribute to cutting peak electrical consumption, while bringing greater comfort to their customers’ lives as well as helping to protect the global environment.
