【Ten Years of Rapid Development in Chemical Engineering Equipment】From 1577 to 2024: The eighth-generation domestic cold hydrogenation reactors were put into large-scale use

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2024: A year of blooming flowers and joy – Happy Forum **********************【Ten Years of Progress in Chemical Processing Equipment】Ongoing updates and summaries available; feel free to join the discussions at https://bbs.hcbbs.com/thread-3576046-1-1.html (Source: Haichuan Chemical Forum Website) ***************** Recently, it was learned from Zhongsheng Technology (Jiangsu) Co., Ltd. that the eighth-generation cold hydrogenation reactor developed by its R&D team for polycrystalline silicon has been put into widespread use in the market. The cold hydrogenation reactor is the key equipment for producing polysilicon, which is the main raw material in the photovoltaic industry. In the early days, domestic polysilicon production primarily relied on foreign processes; not only were these processes costly, but they also generated large amounts of flammable, explosive, and highly corrosive by-products in the form of silicon tetrachloride. When exposed to humid air, this substance decomposes into silicic acid and highly toxic hydrogen chloride gas, posing serious hazards. “The equipment and processes used for the early production of polysilicon were all imported from abroad, representing typical ‘bottleneck’ technologies. ”Guo Hongxin, chairman of Zhongsheng Technology, explained that in order to overcome this technical challenge, Zhongsheng Technology formed a young team of over 20 members – the New Energy High-Efficiency Equipment Engineering Technology Research Center – to start striving for the pinnacle of industry technology. Through extensive research and experimentation, the R&D team spent over a year overcoming various challenges related to the design of equipment and key components in the manufacture of cryogenic hydrogenation reactors, as well as the use of special materials. In 2008, Zhongsheng Technology successfully launched China’s first cold hydrogenation reactor developed independently. Compared to imported equipment, it can convert silicon tetrachloride generated during the polysilicon production process into the raw material trichlorosilane for reuse, thereby **reducing the costs of photovoltaic raw materials while completely solving the environmental issues associated with the production process. After the first generation of cryohydration reactors was introduced to the market, Zhongsheng Technology subsequently launched the second, third generations, and so on; to date, the latest version has been upgraded to the eighth generation. The first and second generations of cold hydrogenation reactors had an uneven tank shape that was larger at the top and smaller at the bottom. With continuous improvements in material quality and manufacturing processes, the seventh and eighth generations featured tanks that were uniformly shaped throughout with protrusions on the top; the diameter of the eighth-generation cold hydrogenation reactor devices reached 4.5 meters. According to statistics provided by the Silicon Industry Branch of the China Non-ferrous Metals Industry Association as well as public information, out of the 10 major polysilicon production projects that came online in 2022, 8 of them used cold hydrogenation reactors manufactured by Zhongsheng Technology. In recent years, starting with cold hydrogenation reactors, Zhongsheng Technology has been investing continuously in research and development related to polysilicon production equipment, and to date it has built up a rich portfolio of next-generation products. Among them, cutting-edge products such as electronic-grade reduction furnaces and particle silicon fluidized-bed reactors exhibit strong competitiveness and growth potential in helping the photovoltaic industry reduce energy consumption and achieve self-sufficiency in raw materials for the semiconductor industry.