The Hydrogen to Humber project announced in July will be one of the world’s first at-scale facilities to produce the chemical element from natural gas in combination with carbon capture, utilisation, and storage. We take a look at the scope of the project and find out what it could mean for the future of the fuel in the UK.
To be located at Saltend Chemicals Park, near Hull, the Hydrogen to Humber Saltend (H2H) project is expected to be one of the world’s biggest at scale, low-carbon hydrogen production facilities.
The project, which was greenlighted in July this year, will use a 600MW auto thermal reformer that will convert natural gas to hydrogen, with carbon capture technology removing CO2 from the production process – the procedure for making blue hydrogen.
According to the project managers, Equinor, the facility will reduce emissions from the park by nearly 900,000 tonnes of CO2 per year. It will do this, Equinor says, by enabling neighbouring industrial operations to switch to hydrogen and the resident power plant to shift to a 30% hydrogen-to-natural-gas blend.
The project falls under the UK government’s plans to establish the first net-zero industrial cluster in the world by 2040, for which it is providing £170m in funding to qualifying projects. Saltend, which is the UK’s largest industrial cluster, hopes to play a big part and be a springboard for a much larger hydrogen economy to develop in the country that will lead to reduced carbon emissions, new jobs, and infrastructure.
The project does have its critics, however. Detractors of blue hydrogen say, due to the use of natural gas in the process, the fuel isn’t low-carbon enough and the UK should instead be aiming for green hydrogen, which is generated via electrolysis of water using renewable power.
Hedging its bets
The UK Committee on Climate Change has said that carbon capture, utilisation, and storage (CCUS) and hydrogen are vital technologies for achieving the ambitious emissions savings needed to meet the 2050 carbon reduction targets. And Martin Tengler, analyst at BloombergNEF, says that Humber is a logical place to start developing hydrogen because it’s a large industrial cluster.
“Everything is there – the demand, the supply of natural gas, and the carbon storage opportunities, such as the salt caverns nearby. Hydrogen transport costs are also likely to be low as only short pipelines would be needed,” he explains.
Saltend and the Humber region employs 55,000 people in the manufacturing sector alone, and it is hoped that the hydrogen produced there can eventually expand to serve these industrial users, as well as others.
Source : power-technology
