Norway’s Equinor said that it collaberated with France’s Engie to develop a project designed to produce low-carbon hydrogen from natural gas in Belgium.
The announcement of the H2BE project — which aims to produce hydrogen from natural gas using autothermal reforming (ATR) combined with carbon capture and storage (CCS) — follows a memorandum of understanding between the two companies signed in February.
The Belgian government released its hydrogen strategy in October and Equinor said the H2BE project would help Belgium deliver on the strategy.
Equinor is a major supplier of Norwegian gas to Belgium, with deliveries sent into the Zeebrugge receiving terminal.
It said the ATR technology allows for decarbonization rates above 95% and for producing hydrogen at large scale at “competitive” cost levels.
The cost of producing blue hydrogen — hydrogen produced from natural gas with CCS — is currently much cheaper than green hydrogen production using electrolysis.
Equinor said that the H2BE project would see the captured CO2 transported in liquid form and to be permanently and safely stored at a site in the sub-surface of the Norwegian North Sea.
Equinor and Engie now plan to launch a feasibility study to assess the technical and economic suitability of a site in the Ghent area to produce the hydrogen.
“Commercial talks with potential hydrogen offtakers, predominantly large, hard-to-abate industries, continue simultaneously,” Equinor said.
Discussions are also ongoing with North Sea Port on integration with port infrastructure, it said, while Belgian grid operator Fluxys is also joining the project.
“Having necessary hydrogen and CO2 infrastructure in place are crucial elements for the success of the project,” Equinor said.
“Making substantial volumes available to the market, the H2BE project would be a key building block for the open access hydrogen and CO2 infrastructure that Fluxys Belgium is planning to develop to connect supply and demand across industrial clusters in Belgium and neighboring countries,” it said.
All partners aim to start operations well before 2030 in order to contribute to Belgium’s 2030 interim decarbonization targets.