In a sprawling greenhouse with shiny silver ducts running through, stacks of cardboard boxes feature prints of a flower alongside the distinctive red Toyota logo.
In an experiment aimed at putting to use some of the carbon dioxide blamed for global warming, the giant auto group is using Asia’s largest greenhouse for potted flowers, stretching across 20,000m².
“Nowadays you automatically think of C0² as a villain. But it’s what plants need to grow,” said Teruo Takatomi of Toyota Floritech Co Ltd.
The system generates power by burning natural gas, with electricity used for lighting over plants, “waste” heat for warming water, and emitted carbon dioxide falling on plants to promote their photosynthesis.
“You have gas emissions when you generate electricity. After removing nitrogen oxide from the gas, C0² is returned here for plants to inhale,” farm chief Takuya Sato said.
The new system, introduced in March, is expected to help the company slash C0² emissions by a combined 460 tonnes a year, he said.
The farm is the first large commercial facility in Japan to introduce a form of “trigeneration” system — production and use of three different resources from a single fuel, according to project partner Kansai Electric Power Co.
The system comes along with a machine that provides high-oxygen water to help invigorate plant roots.
“The point of the system is — let’s generate power and use the byproduct too, leaving almost nothing wasted,” said Hiroshi Teshima, of Kansai Electric.
“People who grow plants say that C0² during winter is as effective as sunlight,” he said.
Kansai Electric, Toyota Floritech and other firms spent ¥70 million (US$650,000) to install the system at the greenhouse on Japan’s main island of Honshu, which is a few minutes drive from a major nuclear fuel plant.
Another ¥120 million was spent to switch the energy source from heavy oil to natural gas by building a satellite tower to store liquefied natural gas.
“Agriculture of course absorbs C0² thanks to photosynthesis but we hope this system will help cut the gas further,” said Masao Ikoma, managing director at Kansai Electric.
Toyota Floritech is a 50-50 joint venture between Toyota Motor Corp and Hakusan Co Ltd, a Japanese firm dealing with seeds and seedling.
The basic design of the automated farm came from Denmark. It employs only eight full-time, non-clerical employees who work in the greenhouse with support of 30 to 40 part-timers.
Toyota Motor, reputed for its production efficiency, has helped the subsidiary but its expertise does not always apply to agriculture, the farm chief said.
“We have received useful tips. For example, these lines,” Sato said, referring to white and yellow lines drawn on the floor showing what areas are for humans and for machines.
He also said the auto giant had taught the farm to tidy things up in clearly labeled boxes to keep the manufacturing floor clean.
“But we are handling living things. Life is very different from machines and components,” Sato said.
“Supposing you are assembling a car, you wouldn’t miss the schedule even by one day. But it’s totally impossible to keep plants production precisely on time,” he said.
Japanese technology giant Softbank Group Corp said Tuesday it has sold its stake in Nvidia Corp, raising US$5.8 billion to pour into other investments. It also reported its profit nearly tripled in the first half of this fiscal year from a year earlier. Tokyo-based Softbank said it sold the stake in Silicon Vally-based Nvidia last month, a move that reflects its shift in focus to OpenAI, owner of the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT. Softbank reported its profit in the April-to-September period soared to about 2.5 trillion yen (about US$13 billion). Its sales for the six month period rose 7.7 percent year-on-year
CRESTING WAVE: Companies are still buying in, but the shivers in the market could be the first signs that the AI wave has peaked and the collapse is upon the world Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday reported a new monthly record of NT$367.47 billion (US$11.85 billion) in consolidated sales for last month thanks to global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Last month’s figure represented 16.9 percent annual growth, the slowest pace since February last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 11 percent. Cumulative sales in the first 10 months of the year grew 33.8 percent year-on-year to NT$3.13 trillion, a record for the same period in the company’s history. However, the slowing growth in monthly sales last month highlights uncertainty over the sustainability of the AI boom even as
AI BOOST: Next year, the cloud and networking product business is expected to remain a key revenue pillar for the company, Hon Hai chairman Young Liu said Manufacturing giant Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday posted its best third-quarter profit in the company’s history, backed by strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers. Net profit expanded 17 percent annually to NT$57.67 billion (US$1.86 billion) from NT$44.36 billion, the company said. On a quarterly basis, net profit soared 30 percent from NT$44.36 billion, it said. Hon Hai, which is Apple Inc’s primary iPhone assembler and makes servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s AI accelerators, said earnings per share expanded to NT$4.15 from NT$3.55 a year earlier and NT$3.19 in the second quarter. Gross margin improved to 6.35 percent,
BUST FEARS: While a KMT legislator asked if an AI bubble could affect Taiwan, the DGBAS minister said the sector appears on track to continue growing The local property market has cooled down moderately following a series of credit control measures designed to contain speculation, the central bank said yesterday, while remaining tight-lipped about potential rule relaxations. Lawmakers in a meeting of the legislature’s Finance Committee voiced concerns to central bank officials that the credit control measures have adversely affected the government’s tax income and small and medium-sized property developers, with limited positive effects. Housing prices have been climbing since 2016, even when the central bank imposed its first set of control measures in 2020, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lo Ting-wei (羅廷瑋) said. “Since the second half of
RSS