UK-focused Essar Oil has taken delivery of a £45mn ($54mn) hydrogen-ready furnace that will be installed at its Stanlow refinery in the UK, replacing three furnaces currently used at the site.

Furnaces, or process heaters, provide the heat required to vaporise hydrocarbon fluids during refining processes.

The furnace will initially be fired by natural gas but will be capable of running on hydrogen in the future.

“The new furnace is the first of its kind at any refinery in the UK and demonstrates clearly Essar’s long-term commitment towards decarbonising our operations and helping lead the UK’s low-carbon transition,” says Deepak Maheshwari, CEO at Essar Oil UK.

“The new furnace is the first of its kind at any refinery in the UK” Maheshwari, Essar

Set to be installed in 2022, the furnace will become fully operational next year.

Essar’s Stanlow refinery—which supplies 16pc of the UK’s road transport fuels—is part of the Hynet North West cluster, designated as a ‘track one’ cluster by government last year, meaning it is eligible for the first round of state finance.

The cluster will be home to the Hynet Hydrogen Production Project developed by Vertex Hydrogen—a joint venture launched in January between Essar and low-carbon technology firm Progressive Energy and located onsite at Stanlow.

The plant will produce 3TWh/yr of low-carbon hydrogen from 2026, with a goal to eventually raise this to 3TWh/yr when a second plant is operational. The plant will use UK company Johnson Matthey’s blue hydrogen technology.

As well as being used by Essar, the hydrogen will be supplied to a wide range of businesses across northwest England—including UK-based Tata Chemicals Europe, glass manufacturer Encirc and power generator Intergen—by way of a new pipeline network under development by gas network operator Cadent.

CCUS infrastructure to capture CO₂ from the blue hydrogen production process will be constructed as part of the first phase of the Hynet cluster’s development between 2022 and 2024.

There are also plans to use hydrogen in the processes of a local facility operated by chemicals firm Unilever and glass manufacturer Pilkington.

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Author: Tom Young