Equinor has announced it is tripling its ambitions for producing low-carbon hydrogen in the UK to 1.8GW. This positions the British energy provider to deliver over half of the UK’s 5GW ambition by 2030.
Equinor is a partner in The Zero Carbon Humber (ZCH) initiative and plans to use the hydrogen to further decarbonise the Humber, UK’s largest emitting industrial region. Currently, the partnership is developing several projects sharing CO2 and hydrogen infrastructure to deliver clean energy and power to industries in the region.
The ambitious announcement was made in a meeting with UK Energy Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng and Norway’s Energy Minister Tina Bru in Oslo on 28 June, when Equinor’s president and CEO, Anders Opedal, underlined the company’s ambitions in the UK. “Without CCS and hydrogen, at scale, there is no viable path to net zero and realising the Paris goals. Our low-carbon projects in the UK build on our own industrial experience and will play a major role in setting the UK’s industrial heartlands in a leading position. The projects will also contribute to providing hydrogen and low carbon solutions to three to five industrial clusters by 2035. We will do so by working together with governments, partners and customers,” said Anders Opedal.
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Equinor’s increased ambitions for low-carbon hydrogen production has been spurred by several key projects:
- H2H Saltend project, a 600MW gas reformer that will produce hydrogen from natural gas with carbon capture. This will enable fuel switching by industrial users at Saltend Chemicals Park and the onsite Saltend Cogeneration Power Station switching to a hydrogen fuel blend. It will reduce CO2 emissions from Saltend by nearly one million tonnes annually.
- 1,200MW of low-carbon hydrogen production principally to fuel the Keadby Hydrogen power station. Equinor is co-developing the project with SSE Thermal, which could be the world’s first large scale 100% hydrogen-fuelled power station. The flexible, low-carbon power production from this project will be key to supporting variable renewable power production, ensuring reliable access to electricity.
- With its partners in the Northern Endurance Partnership, Equinor is also developing the offshore infrastructure to transport and store CO2 from projects in the East Coast Cluster. The ZCH onshore pipeline network, developed by Equinor and National Grid Ventures, will link H2H Saltend to the energy-intensive industrial sites in the region.
Equinor has the ambition to play a leading role in developing new CCS value chains and hydrogen projects in both Norway and the UK.
