US consumer goods giant Kimberly-Clark plans to switch from gas to green hydrogen to fire industrial boilers at two of its UK manufacturing facilities for brands such as Andrex toilet paper and Kleenex tissues.

Hyro—a joint venture between engineering firm RES and energy retailer Octopus—will develop the onsite electrolysers at the factories in Wales and southeast England, which will have a combined capacity of 22.5MW and produce green hydrogen for firing in hydrogen-ready boilers.

The two electrolyser projects, as well as a third aiming to supply green hydrogen to a whisky distillery in Scotland, were shortlisted by the government last week for revenue support. Contracts for 250MW of capacity will be awarded in Q4 this year, with first production expected by 2025.

“These developments represent a huge step towards our ambition to move solely to renewable energy to manufacture Andrex, Kleenex, Huggies, Wypall and Scott in the UK by 2030,” says Oriol Margo, Emea sustainability lead at Kimberly-Clark. The company has signed a power-purchase agreement with Octopus for electricity from a 50MW onshore windfarm in Scotland, expected to cover 80pc of its factories’ electricity demand.

“A lot of hard work has gone into developing the green hydrogen projects and I is fantastic to see the UK government selecting them for the funding shortlist,” he adds.

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Author: Polly Martin