Over USD700m of US federal funding is being made available for Gulf Coast-based chemical and refining projects to use clean hydrogen in their operations, as per Hview.
Coming as part of a USD6bn funding package from the US Department of Energy (DOE), four projects have been selected to negotiate funding for their respective plans that hope to clean up chemical production and refining with low-carbon hydrogen.
Backed by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) and Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), US Energy Secretary, Jennifer Granholm, said the investments would “slash emissions” from hard-to-abate sectors.
ExxonMobil could receive up to USD331.9m of funding for its Baytown Olefins Plant Carbon Reduction Project, which aims to use hydrogen instead of natural gas across high heat-fired equipment using new burner technologies for ethylene production.
The plant is where the energy giant is looking to establish a 900,000 tonne per year blue hydrogen project which is expected to start production in 2028.
Exxon’s Chief Executive Darren Woods reportedly said last week that the project could be scrapped if it wasn’t eligible for IRA production tax credits. However, if the project is successful, once fully implemented, the company expects to cut more than 50% of the existing plant’s emissions.
T.EN Stone & Webster Process Technology has also been invited to negotiate up to USD200m of funding for its Sustainable Ethylene from CO2 Utilisation with Renewable Energy (SECURE) project on the Gulf Coast.
In partnership with LanzaTech, T.EN plans to demonstrate ethanol and ethylene production through a biotech process using captured CO2 and green hydrogen.
Demark’s Orsted has also been selected for up to USD100m for its Star e-Methanol project which plans to use CO2 and clean hydrogen to produce up to 300,000 tonnes of e-methanol per year on the Texas Gulf Coast.
The project is hoped to prove both supply and demand is there for hydrogen-based fuels in the marine and transportation sectors.
Melissa Peterson, Head of Onshore and P2X Americas at Orsted, said the production of e-methanol would be “critical” to achieving “rapid decarbonisation” for the most hard-to-electrify sectors.
BASF will also be negotiating up to USD75m of funding for its Syngas Production from Recycled Chemical Byproduct Streams project in Freeport, Texas.
With plans to recycle liquid by-products into syngas (carbon monoxide and hydrogen) for use as a feedstock at BAFS’ operations using plasma gasification, BASF expects the technology and renewable power could replace natural gas-fired incineration.
Under the same funding package, the DOE earmarked USD1bn for hydrogen-based steel production projects in Mississippi and Ohio.
mrchub.com