Fundamental Study on the Establishment of Innovative System on Hydrogen Storage and Transportation using Lithium Hydride.

近年来，从能源利用效率和环境保护的观点出发，氢能源如燃料电池技术得到了广泛的发展。然而，由于氢气的密度较低且沸点极低，因此尚未建立有效的储存和运输方法。因此，作者为在室温下使用氢化锂（LiH）储运提供了一种新的方法。金属锂与氢气反应生成氢化锂，并根据需要运输到需要的地方。氢是通过LiH与水蒸气反应产生的。然后，LiOH作为反应的副产物产生，并且必须返回以产生金属锂，用于建立使用LiH的氢利用的整个循环。本研究成功地开发了熔融盐电解LiOH制锂工艺，并对金属锂与氢气的反应机理进行了研究。

Hydrogen energy is widely developed recently from the viewpoint of efficient energy utilization and the environmental conservation such as a fuel cell technology. However, efficient methods for the storage and transportation are not yet established due the lower density and extremely low boiling temperature of hydrogen. Therefore, authors made an offer new method for the storage and transportation using lithium hydride, LiH at room temperature. Metallic lithium is let to react with hydrogen to form lithium hydride and is transported to the place on demand. The hydrogen is generated by reacting of LiH with water vapor. Then, LiOH is generated as a by-product of the reaction and must be returned to produce metallic lithium for establishing the whole cycle of hydrogen utilization using LiH. In this study, lithium production from LiOH through the molten salt electrolysis was successfully developed, and the mechanism of the reaction of metallic lithium with hydro- gen was made clear.