A huge part of the Humber’s plan to drive the NetZero agenda has been revealed.
The neighbouring South Bank refineries, their power supplier and Uniper - E.on’s fossil fuels entity - have united to bring forward a large-scale hydrogen and carbon capture operation. Project director Jonathan Briggs spoke to Business Live .
With increasing acceleration, the Humber’s pole positioning around the low carbon and no carbon agenda - from a starting point at the back of the grid - has been a highlight of the past year.
From last June's Drax-led joint venture proposal, through to the late summer launch of the Zero Starts Here campaign, and now to Tuesday’s MoU agreement for the oil and power giants, there has been a flurry of activity.
Hydrogen and carbon capture and storage are plugging into the Energy Estuary’s pace-setting gains in offshore wind as a region so reliant on heavy industry looks to turn figures - and fumes - on their head in a journey that is nothing short of remarkable. Protecting heavy industry in a green world.
While it was a small milestone for those involved, the unveiling brought the latest strand to the fore, and provided an understanding of the connectivity involved.
Mr Briggs, is part of Vitol Group - owner of the combined heat and power plant known as VPI Immingham - brought forward and expanded by Phillips 66 before being sold off to a specialist now keen to grow again.
“This is another step in a fairly long term project, but a step in the right direction,” he said of the announcement.
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Experienced in CCS, primarily with BP in the 海角视频 and US, he was there when development of an early project in Peterhead, Scotland, began in 2005 - a first version - while leading a last commercial attempt in 2015.
He sees a huge opportunity for the Humber.
“We have absolutely first class partners, and it is a sizeable cluster in itself. With the CHP plant you have an existing mightily-sized efficient power generation asset, basically plugged in to 25 per cent of the 海角视频’s refining capacity. You really have a very concentrated opportunity to make a big step forward in terms of emissions mitigation and deploying technology.
“One of the advantages is multiple technology deployment, you can do a lot of things in one place at scale. It really is a strategically-blessed geographical location. Going on from that, we have wind generation deployed with Hornsea, that has a role in one of the pieces of the Humber Zero proposal - to put in green hydrogen electrolysis for it then to be used in the CHP plant and in the refineries.
“There’s also Immingham, a deep water port. The port is a really big part of the project as it really does open up the possibility, whether that is CO2 or hydrogen production, a premium product has import/export right there.”
How, and how big will depend on government support for the co-funders now gathered.
“We have a team on board to develop all of the technical bases,” Mr Briggs said. “We will be applying for and putting forward the project for government programmes for them to participate in. Fundamentally, next year, early next year, we want to be going into front-end engineering design and have the project operational in the mid-2020s.
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“Cost depends on the ultimate configuration. One of the advantages is a number of different components, there’s pre-combustion components, post-combustion components, it depends on the scale at which the government wants to support.
“We are definitely in the tens of millions to get to a financial investment decision, the absolute size depends on the ambition of the government. The likes of Phillips 66 would like to move forward with the whole thing to get to scale quickly - it depends on the government.”
Announcing the MoU, an initial decarbonisation of eight million tonnes per annum of CO2 emissions was highlighted in the immediate cluster, with the potential to target 30 million tonnes of CO2 emissions from the wider Humber, moving west of Immingham.
British Steel, the new Keadby Two power station and the mothball-proposed Cemex South Ferriby cement plant all have emissions to address.
Here too is where connectivity is key, with Drax, Equinor and National Grid behind a project at the opposite end of the estuary, and ITM Power, Orsted and Phillips 66 uniting on the wind front.
“This is part of a greater Humber cluster, and we’ll be working together on a common approach,” Mr Briggs said. “This is the largest cluster in the 海角视频, and it is the only way [to deliver], having multiple projects going forward, because if we are going to get to the 2050 target we need to get started and build the volume pretty quickly, particularly in the Humber.
NetZero on the Humber
“It is not unusual at all. We are collaborating, working with other projects in the Humber and in particular with transport and storage providers Equinor and National Grid.
“We are very much working together on that basis. The fact we have a lot of projects - not just in the Humber - is also because a very strong goal has been set. It is real progress the government is making to develop and put funding projects together.”