Uniper has signed an agreement with Shell to progress plans to produce blue hydrogen at Uniper’s Killingholme power station site in the East of England. The hydrogen produced could be used to decarbonise industry, transport and power throughout the Humber region. So-called ‘blue’ hydrogen is the result of splitting natural gas into H2 and CO2.
The Humber Hub Blue project includes plans for a blue hydrogen production facility with a capacity of up to 720 MW using gas reformation technology with carbon capture and storage (CCS).
The captured carbon would be fed through the proposed Zero Carbon Humber onshore pipeline, part of the East Coast Cluster, recently selected as one of two CCS clusters to receive initial government support under its cluster sequencing process, for which the project recently passed the eligibility criteria for Phase-2 for cluster sequencing. Successful projects which could be eligible for government funding will be shortlisted from May 2022. Phase-2 projects are expected to take final investment decisions from 2024 to then be operational from 2027. Blue hydrogen production at Killingholme could see the capture of around 1.6 million metric tonnes (Mt) of carbon a year through CCS. The UK government has set a target to capture 10 Mt of carbon a year by 2030.
The agreement follows a memorandum of understanding signed by both companies in 2021 to explore accelerating the development of a hydrogen economy in Europe. Shell and Uniper will now jointly progress process design studies and site development activity, with a view to taking the project to front end engineering and design by 2023.
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