Canada’s Questerre to study blue hydrogen
Canada’s Questerre Energy, sitting on an estimated 20 trillion ft3 of shale gas resource in the Utica basin, said April 6 it had signed a letter of intent with ZEG Power to evaluate incorporating the Norwegian company’s blue hydrogen technology into Questerre’s nascent Clean Tech Energy project in Quebec.
“ZEG Power has designed a one step process that produces hydrogen and captures the carbon dioxide with improved economics,” Questerre CEO Michael Binnion said. “We are studying how to incorporate it into our project in Quebec.”
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Questerre announced in December 2020 it would look to incorporate a hydrogen component into its Quebec project, which has so far failed to gain much traction in a province with abundant hydroelectric assets and a growing green hydrogen sector.
Binnion said Questerre’s goal is to deliver a net negative carbon project that would reduce, recycle and store CO2 emissions, creating a “paradigm shift” in sustainable energy.
“The ZEG Power process produces zero emissions hydrogen and a pure stream of carbon dioxide that can be recycled to make other low emissions products including concrete, plastics, fertiliser, and other industrial feedstocks,” he said. “Any excess emissions can be permanently stored.”
Under the terms of the letter of intent, Questerre and ZEG will explore joint venture opportunities to apply ZEG’s technology to the production of clean hydrogen and/or clean power from Questerre’s Clean Gas project. This would include the engineering and due diligence for a demonstration plant concept and commercial scale-up, and would provide Questerre the exclusive Canadian rights to ZEG Power’s technology for one year from the completion of engineering, and first refusal rights in Canada thereafter.
“We are very pleased to announce the cooperation with Questerre,” ZEG Power CCO Kathrine Ryengen said. “Their Clean Tech Energy project in Quebec represents a unique opportunity for us to commercialise our technology in Canada. We will build on the learnings from the engineering recently completed for our first plant at the CCB Energy Park in Kollsnes, on the west coast of Norway, where we expect production to commence in 2022.”