Europe's Oil and Energy Companies Team Up to Win Hydrogen Race

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--European oil, gas and energy companies are teaming up at a faster pace to see who will dominate the emerging market for low-carbon and carbon-neutral hydrogen.

Norway's oil and gas major Equinor (NYSE:EQNR) and French energy utility ENGIE have entered into a partnership to develop joint low-carbon hydrogen activities in Belgium, France and the Netherlands. At the same time, energy company Enel Green Power and Italian refiner Saras have signed a memorandum of intent to develop a green hydrogen project in Sardinia, Italy. Last month, Industrial Info reported that the Port of Rotterdam was pushing to become Europe's leading hub for hydrogen following deal that could see a large, commercial scale green hydrogen plant built with power company Uniper at one of its power plants in Maasvlakte area of the port by 2025. The plant will initially have a capacity of 100 megawatts (MW), with the aim of expanding this capacity to 500 MW. For additional information, see February 16, 2021, article--New Hydrogen Plant in The Works for Port of Rotterdam.

Equinor and ENGIE plan to investigate the production and market potential for hydrogen from natural gas--called blue hydrogen--where the CO2 will be removed from the natural gas before being stored permanently offshore. The companies claimed that it "essential" to develop low-carbon and renewable hydrogen projects at scale in order to make it possible for industrial customers to significantly reduce CO2 emissions before 2030. Like others, they believe the development of low-carbon and renewable hydrogen will accelerate the construction of new hydrogen infrastructure and repurpose the current natural gas infrastructure.

Grete Tveit, Equinor's senior vice president for Low Carbon Solutions, said: "Equinor aims to be a leading company in the energy transition. We believe that hydrogen and CCS will be vital if we are going to succeed with the transition. Collaboration and partnerships will be absolutely necessary to find the best solutions. Our two companies have complementary areas of expertise that we can utilize to develop low carbon hydrogen initiatives together."

In December, Equinor and German energy company RWE joined Europe's biggest green hydrogen project, NortH2, which aims to produce green hydrogen using renewable electricity from offshore wind off the coast of Netherlands. Launched in February 2020 with Shell, Groningen Seaports Gasunie and the province of Groningen, the project will have a capacity of 1 gigawatt (GW) in 2027, 4 GW by 2030 and 10+GW by 2040 for electrolysis. This equates to 0.4 million tonnes of green hydrogen production in 2030 and 1 million tonnes green hydrogen production by 2040. Recently, ENGIE announced it was teaming up with Total (NYSE:TOT) to design, develop, build and operate the "Masshylia" project, France's largest renewable hydrogen production site at the La Mède biorefinery in the south of the country. Powered by solar farms with a total capacity of more than 100 MW, the 40-MW electrolyser will produce 5 tonnes of green hydrogen per day to meet the needs of the biofuel production process at the La Mède biorefinery. Construction will begin next year with a view to production starting in 2024.

Enel Green Power and Saras plan to build a 20-MW electrolyser powered by renewable energy produced onsite at the Saras refinery, to provide green hydrogen to be used as a raw material at the refinery which makes up part of the Sarroch industrial site in the province of Cagliari. "We at Saras have been focusing on the challenges of energy transition for some time now, and in recent years we have strengthened our skill base with a series of projects designed to significantly reduce the refinery's carbon footprint," said Dario Scaffardi, chief executive officer of Saras. "This collaboration with Enel Green Power allows us to develop with an ideal partner one of these projects; that is the production and use of green hydrogen, now considered one of the strategies with the greatest potential for the decarbonization of refining processes and the production of new generation fuels."

Industrial Info Resources (IIR), with global headquarters in Sugar Land, Texas, six offices in North America and 12 international offices, is the leading provider of global market intelligence specializing in the industrial process, heavy manufacturing and energy markets. Our European headquarters are located in Galway, Ireland. Follow IIR Europe on: Facebook - Twitter - LinkedIn For more information on our European coverage send inquiries to info@industrialinfo.eu or visit us online at Industrial Info Europe.