Hydrogen Market Review

Australia and the UK will cooperate on developing low emissions solutions. The partnership was signed by Angus Taylor, Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction, and Kwasi Kwarteng, UK Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. Both countries will work on technologies such as carbon capture and storage (CCS), clean hydrogen, green steel and carbon capture and use (CCUS). The partnership is a part of the Australian government $565.8 million plan, making low emissions technologies cheaper and attracting more investments.

In Australia, Lavo, Ampcontrol, and Boundary Power signed an agreement under which Lavo will facilitate its partners with hydrogen storage solutions and other low emission products, and the partners will identify their uses in different demonstration sites including hybrid power supplies, wind and solar projects, and other industrial and mining applications.

The Australian based company Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) signed a partnership with JSW Future Energy Ltd to develop green hydrogen projects in India. Both partners will perform scoping work for the potential projects related to green hydrogen and also the projects to utilise the green hydrogen in various areas such as green steel, mobility, green ammonia and other industrial applications.

In Poland, the European Investment Bank (EIB) has partnered with the Polish Cluster of Hydrogen Technologies under the framework of the InnovFin initiative. The partnership will provide support to the investments in clean hydrogen technologies of the country. The partnership will focus on the research, the machinery required for hydrogen production, and R&D projects in the country.

The UK-based Johnson Matthey (JM) acquired the assets of Oxis Energy Ltd- a developer of lithium-sulfur batteries. JM now aims to use the assets of Oxis Energy to produce green hydrogen. The acquiring of Oxis assets will increase the company’s hydrogen business by expanding its ability to test and produce catalyst coated membranes and other advanced materials that are used in hydrogen production. The acquired site has the capacity to produce thousands of catalyst coated membranes annually, which are enough to equip hundreds of megawatts of electrolyser capacity.

Also in the UK, the HyDeploy project of blending hydrogen with natural gas in a public gas network received the green light from Health and Safety Executive (HSE). The project will be performed in Winlaton, Gateshead, which Northern Gas Networks operate. It is a ten-month-long pilot project and aims to blend around 20% of hydrogen, serving 668 homes, a school, and some small businesses in Winlaton. It is expected to start in August 2021. The UK has been facing around a third of carbon emissions from heating homes through natural gas, and now heating through hydrogen will provide a viable way to reduce emissions and help the country achieve its goal of Net Zero carbon emissions by 2050.

The Norwegian based company GreenStat AS announced that it made a partnership with AVG Group Sarl (AVG). AVG provided funding to GreenStat as well as both partners will also work to expand GreenStat’s hydrogen technologies to the US and Asian markets.

In Ireland, SSE Renewables and Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy partnered for producing green hydrogen through the electrolysis process. The two onshore wind farms will provide power to the electrolysis in Scotland and Ireland. The partnership’s main aim is to co-locate two hydrogen production facilities, one each in Scotland and Ireland, at their onshore wind farms. Both companies also have the target of working with potential hydrogen users across various industries such as transportation and others. The partnership also aims to work on the full value chain of hydrogen such as storage, production, supply chain and end-user requirements.

In Germany, partners of the AquaSector project announced that they have further strengthened their partnership to develop an offshore hydrogen park. The partners in the project include RWE, Shell, Gasunie and Equinor. The project’s main aim is to demonstrate that offshore-based hydrogen production can facilitate efficient, sustainable and cost-effective ways to produce hydrogen in Germany. Under the AquaSector project, partners are working to install around 300 MW of electrolyser, which will have an offshore green hydrogen production capacity of about 20,000 tonnes/year. The produced hydrogen will be then transported to Heligoland through the pipeline known as AquaDuctus, which is expected to start transportation in 2028.

In Germany, MAN Energy Solutions and Andritz Hydro partnered under which both companies will work together to develop hydrogen projects that will produce green hydrogen from hydropower. The collaboration will start its developments through the pilot project in Europe, which is expected to start by the end of the year. The project will have 650 tonnes of green hydrogen by using electrolysis of 4 MW. Initially, the hydrogen produced will be used locally. In the coming years, the electrolysis capacity will be increased to 100 MW. Both companies will also identify other projects under the H2 Global initiative of the German Federal Government.

The French multinational Air Liquide announced to have partnered with institutions and industrial players of South Korea to develop the country’s low carbon hydrogen production. Air Liquide is helping the country in reaching its goal of becoming the world leader in hydrogen mobility by making investments across the entire hydrogen supply chain. The company has already started various projects and partnerships in the country, such as the partnership with SK E&S under which both are working to develop the hydrogen liquefaction plant, which will have the capacity of 90 tonnes/day of liquid hydrogen. The produced hydrogen will be used in mobility markets of the country. The company has also supplied around eight hydrogen stations to South Korea.

In North America, the US-based company Jera Americas Inc., a subsidiary of Jera Co., Inc., announced that the Linden Gas-fired Power Generation Project of Jera has partnered with Phillips 66. Under the partnership, Phillips will supply fuel gas to the operating company, including hydrogen. The operating company plans to make developments in Linden Gas Thermal Power Station Unit 6 by using the received fuel gas, which also contains hydrogen, and co-fired it with natural gas. The co-firing will use 40% of hydrogen, and it will cut 10% emissions annually from Unit 6. The modifications are expected to complete by 2022.

Also, in the US the Southern California Gas Co. (SoCalGas) submitted various project initiatives related to hydrogen research and developments to the US Department of Energy’s (DoE) “Earthshot”. SoCalGas has collaborated with the University of California Irvine, University of California Los Angeles, and Green Hydrogen Coalition, among others, for these projects.

In Canada, Air products announced that it selected Haldor Topsoe for the supply of SynCOR™, an autothermal reforming technology, to the hydrogen complex in Canada. SynCOR has the ability to capture around 95% of the produced CO2, which is then stored in an underground facility. The facility itself will help in refining and also in decarbonising the involved processes. It will also produce liquid hydrogen, which will be then used for merchant sales and also in the transportation sector as a clean fuel.