Equinor awards FEED for UK blue hydrogen project

Norway's state oil company Equinor has awarded a front-end engineering design (FEED) contract for the H2H Saltend blue hydrogen project to Germany's Linde, it announced on January 30.

Linde Engineering and BOC, now part of Linde, won a tender to provide the FEED work, with options for contracts for engineering, procurement and construction and operation and maintenance for the first five years.

H2H Saltend is expected to produce 600 MW of hydrogen from North Sea natural gas, equipped with carbon capture equipment. It will employ Linde's hydrogen and air separation technologies, combined with UK-based Johnson Matthey's LCH technology. 

The plant is due on stream by 2027, and is situated at the energy intensive Saltend Chemicals park to the east of Hull, enabling the park to reduce its emissions by up to one third by replacing natural gas at several facilities. Some of the hydrogen will also be blended into natural gas and used at Equinor and SSE's Saltend power plant.

H2H Saltend serves as a sub-project under the Zero Carbon Humber initiative, one of several schemes to decarbonise UK heavy industry. It will also help Equinor fulfil its "Hydrogen to Humber" ambition of delivering 1.8 GW of low-carbon hydrogen for the region – 20% of the UK's national hydrogen production target.

"H2H Saltend is a vital first step in creating a low-carbon hydrogen economy and achieving net zero in the Humber, safeguarding local industries and creating greater opportunities, while helping the UK tackle climate change," Equinor's director for the project, Asbjorn Haugsgjerd, said in a statement.