A Hungarian firm that operates refineries and petrochemical crops, and runs service stations throughout Central and Japanese Europe, mentioned it’s set to start business operation of a 10-MW inexperienced hydrogen manufacturing plant in Százhalombatta, Hungary.
MOL Group, headquartered in Budapest, mentioned the plant will produce 1,600 tonnes of hydrogen yearly utilizing electrical energy from renewable vitality sources. The corporate mentioned the plant on the Danube Refinery represents an funding of €22 million ($23.45 million) and is the biggest plant producing inexperienced hydrogen within the area. The group mentioned the power is a part of “MOL Group’s long-term company technique,” a program often called SHAPE TOMORROW, for carbon neutrality and sustainability.
“MOL Group has reached one other milestone: we are able to now produce inexperienced hydrogen with out producing any greenhouse gases. Utilizing this expertise, we’re capable of obtain the identical emissions discount as if we took roughly 5,500 automobiles off the highway in a single day,” mentioned József Molnár, CEO of MOL Group, on the current inauguration ceremony of the brand new inexperienced hydrogen plant. “As we speak, our new inexperienced hydrogen plant is simply making MOL’s industrial operations greener, however tomorrow it can supply options for the entire business and hydrogen mobility. After Száhalombatta, we are going to take the expertise to the opposite two gas manufacturing items of the group to make the gas manufacturing course of extra sustainable at every of MOL Group’s refineries.”
Officers mentioned using the brand new plant will scale back the refinery’s emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) by 25,000 tonnes every year.
The plant is utilizing electrolysis tools from Latham, New York-based Plug Energy, which makes use of electrical energy produced by renewable vitality to interrupt down water into hydrogen and oxygen. The brand new expertise will regularly exchange the present pure gas-based manufacturing course of on the refinery, which right this moment accounts for one-sixth of the MOL Group’s complete emissions of CO2. The plant will begin producing hydrogen within the second half of 2024, and MOL will use the inexperienced hydrogen primarily in its personal community for gas manufacturing, in line with the corporate.
MOL Group in an April 11 information launch mentioned the expertise “implies that no polluting by-products are generated and, actually, the plant produces 8-9 tonnes of pure oxygen per tonne of hydrogen.”
Andy Marsh, CEO of Plug Energy, mentioned, “We’re thrilled to have fun, in partnership with MOL, the inauguration of one in every of Europe’s largest inexperienced hydrogen crops supporting a refinery. As a potent approach to scale back carbon emissions inside refinery operations, we’re proud to equip MOL with cutting-edge electrolyzer expertise to effectively produce inexperienced hydrogen. Collectively, we’re advancing in direction of carbon neutrality, fostering greener operations, and propelling the hydrogen financial system ahead.”
—Darrell Proctor is a senior affiliate editor for POWER (@POWERmagazine).
