6 Japanese and Australian companies sign MOU for green hydrogen feasibility study

Four Japanese companies, Iwatani Corporation, Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Ltd., Kansai Electric Power Co., Inc., and Marubeni Corporation have come to an agreement and signed a memorandum of understanding with two energy infrastructure companies headquartered in Australia, Stanwell Corporation Limited and APT Management Services Pty Ltd., to jointly implement a feasibility study of the Central Queensland Hydrogen Project. This project will produce hydrogen on a large scale using renewable energy, liquefy it at the Port of Gladstone, Queensland, Australia, and then export the liquefied hydrogen to Japan.

The project aims to produce and supply hydrogen reliably over the long-term and has set goals of producing at least 100 tons of hydrogen per day around 2026, and 800 tons of hydrogen per day from 2031.

Currently, the production volume of liquefied hydrogen in Japan is 30 tons per day maximum, meaning that the target production volume of 800 tons per day from 2031 is about 26 times as much as the current production volume in Japan.

The use of the Aldoga site (235 hectares), a hydrogen production base secured by Stanwell in the Gladstone region, will be considered for the project, and a site of about 100 hectares in Fisherman’s Landing is to be acquired as a hydrogen liquefaction and loading base.

The project will also consider supplying green hydrogen, not only for export to Japan, but also to meet local demand.

The feasibility study will focus on examinations of production technology mainly for green hydrogen, the construction of hydrogen liquefaction plants and liquefied hydrogen carriers, associated finance and environmental assessments, and commercialization models. Kansai Electric Power will test the viability of hydrogen as a fuel for gas-fired power generation and heating energy.