Equinor triples its UK ambitions of low-carbon hydrogen production to 1.8 GW

Equinor, formerly Statoil of Norway, is helping to decarbonise the Humber, the UK’s largest emitting industrial region. The Zero Carbon Humber (ZCH) partnership is developing several projects sharing CO2 and hydrogen infrastructure to deliver clean energy and power to industries in the region.

In a meeting with UK Energy Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng and Norway’s Energy Minister Tina Bru in Oslo on 28 June, Equinor’s President and Chief Executive Officer, Anders Opedal, underlined the company’s ambitions in the UK.

“Without carbon capture and storage (CCS) and hydrogen, at scale, there is no viable path to net zero and realizing the Paris goals,” said Opedal.

Equinor is leading the H2H Saltend project, a 600 MW gas reformer that will produce hydrogen from natural gas with carbon capture. This will enable fuel switching 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.

The increased hydrogen ambitions involve a further 1,200 MW 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. With appropriate policy mechanisms in place, Keadby Hydrogen power station could come online before the end of the decade.

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.