HyNet, a major new project for both the production and industrial use of hydrogen in North West England, has been awarded £13m in government funding.
Based in and around Ellesmere Port south of Liverpool on the River Mersey, HyNet has two separate but complementary strands, both of which are claimed to be the first of their kind. The first strand, which has received £7.5m of funding, will see the development of a new low-carbon hydrogen production plant. The facility will be located at Essar Oil UK’s Stanlow refinery in Ellesmere Port and will produce 3TWh of hydrogen annually, doubling the UK’s capacity. According to the HyNet consortium, the new plant will capture and store more than 95 per cent of the carbon it creates during the hydrogen production process, totalling around 600,000 tonnes of CO2 per year.
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“The Committee on Climate Change is absolutely clear that to deliver Net Zero, hydrogen and carbon capture and storage are going to be a necessity,” said David Parkin, spokesperson for the North West Hydrogen Alliance (NWHA) and director at Progressive Energy, which is leading development on both aspects of HyNet.
“This funding is hugely significant for the North West, and the rest of the UK, providing essential support for HyNet and taking hydrogen energy from aspiration to reality.”
The second strand of HyNet will see hydrogen from the plant used at Unilever’s Port Sunlight manufacturing site up the river, as well as Pilkington’s Greengate Works glass-making plant in nearby St Helens. The use of hydrogen in the glass-making process will be a global first, while the demonstration at Unilever’s Port Sunlight will be the first ‘meaningful use’ of hydrogen in a commercial scale boiler.
“Unilever has a clear ambition of being a carbon neutral company by 2030, and we’re committed to playing our part and doing what we can to help the wider industry move further faster,” said Sebastian Munden, EVP & general manager of Unilever UK & Ireland.
“We already have five carbon neutral sites in the UK, and have been able to reduce our manufacturing carbon footprint by two thirds. The success of this Port Sunlight trial would mean Unilever is able to deliver home and personal care products to our consumers with an even smaller carbon footprint, which we know is of great importance to them.”
Hydrogen will be distributed by way of a new pipeline network under development by Cadent, which will also provide the pathway for renewable hydrogen once costs come down in the future. It is hoped that the project will eventually also deliver hydrogen to domestic customers.
Distinct lack of Engineer-ing information on how this capturing occurs and where the captured CO2 will be stored?
Is the output figure of 3 TWh / year correct? That would be 3000000/8760~=350 MW as hydrogen or 71,000 tpa hydrogen, worth about £ 850 m (sales value). If true it looks like the UK have a real winner, but I suspect a typo!
That figure was provided by the North West Cluster.
Yes, clearly hydrogen as a flexible energy source is the way to go, but we don’t just want to capture CO2, but to release the oxygen bound up with the carbon. Something that vegetation does quite well of course.
Come on “The Engineer”
This is sloppy writing,
Float Glass Manufacturing
Hydrogen is used as a getter gas to prevent oxidation over the tin baths used in the float glass manufacturing process. The Hydrogen keeps the tin baths free of oxidization and thus, the glass formed on the baths is made without defects.
http://www.teledynees.com › hydrogen
Float Glass Manufacturing – Teledyne Energy Systems
The use of hydrogen has been a fundamental facet of float glass production since Mr Pilkington invented it!
What is the true original source of the hydrogen? Is it derived from a hydrocarbon source and at what total cost including production, storage and logistics/distribution. Is the initiative as described really capable of relatively easy replication or is this a site specific opportunity? How has this been calculated and has all of this been reviewed independently? Electrolysis using off peak renewables does not appear to give a consistency in production and is expensive. The whole notion of the hydrogen economy was actively trailed in the 1980s, possibly earlier, but seemed to splutter and fizzle out.
I know a bit about this project. The CO2 is captured as part of the hydrogen production process using a proprietary technology from JM based on a reforming methodology. They are then looking to run a new CO2 pipeline to the Liverpool bay and inject the CO2 into the depleted gas fields there. The 3TWh/year is also correct and in fact is only the first phase. If all goes well, the plan is to install more over time.
Is Hydrogen really going to be the fuel of the future?
It appears counter-intuative to use natural gas to produce hydrogen and then supply it as an alternative fuel. It would be simpler overall to extract the appropriate amount of CO2 from the atmosphere for CCS and then supply the fossil fuel as carbon-offset natural gas.
Audi are doing the opposite – manufacturing e-gas (similar to natural gas) from hydrogen produced using renewably generated electricity.
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/the-future-of-fuels-e-gas
Who is correct, or is this a case of different solutions for different locations?
Fits in well with the HyNet project covered in The Engineer 19/02/2020. I’d rather spent 5 minutes filling my my car with H than wait an hour to fill it with electricity.