Malaysian NOC Petronas could establish a position as one of Southeast Asia’s most competitive producers of green hydrogen by using hydropower to drive electrolysers, says the company’s president and CEO, Muhammad Taufik.

Relatively low levels of solar irradiance and wind could put the country at a disadvantage in terms of electrolysis and create significant intermittency challenges for the wider power system. But low-cost hydropower could boost Petronas’ ability to compete in green hydrogen, Taufik told the International Energy Week conference in London.

“Hydroelectricity could be a source of low-cost electricity for the manufacture of green hydrogen,” he says. “You will need to get electrolysers a lot more efficient and we can potentially scale this very quickly. Malaysia could have a regional leading cost advantage in green hydrogen production because of the low projected levelised cost of energy offered by hydropower.”

Hydropower has the added advantage of generating baseload power supplies.

“Hydroelectricity could be a source of low-cost electricity for the manufacture of green hydrogen” Taufik, Petronas

Petronas has accelerated its plans to be a low-carbon hydrogen supplier during recent months via its clean energy division, Gentari, signing multiple memorandums of understanding with international partners for project development in Malaysia, India and the Middle East as well as with customers in East Asia. It is also studying the development of low-carbon ammonia supply chains.

Gentari has set an ambition to produce up to 1.2mn t/yr of low-carbon hydrogen by 2030, targeting industrial, power and transport applications, although it is not clear how this would be split between green hydrogen and blue hydrogen with CCS.

Taufik also called for a more coordinated approach to financing the energy transition and policy in Asia and other emerging economies. “[The transition] requires a whole systemic response by all the stakeholders, industry, legislators [and] investment community, and that needs to happen very quickly, he says. “A lot of Asia has not moved to making sure there is a price on carbon,” he adds. 

He highlights the need for cross-border partnerships on the movement of CO₂ and better systems to ensure nature-based carbon offsets adhere to globally accepted standards.

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Author: Stuart Penson