New funding for Australian export projects

By Julian Atchison on February 06, 2023

ATCO Australia’s ScaleH2 ammonia export project in NSW has received joint Australian-German government funding as part of the HyGATE program.
Click to learn more. ATCO Australia’s ScaleH2 ammonia export project in NSW has received joint Australian-German government funding as part of the HyGATE program.

ARENA (AU$50 million total) and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (€40 million) have announced four projects will receive joint funding as part of the German-Australian Hydrogen Innovation and Technology Incubator (HyGATE). A solar-to-methanol project in South Australia, a GW-scale renewable hydrogen project in Queensland, commercialisation of Hysata’s unique electrolysis technology and ATCO Australia’s ScaleH2 ammonia export project in New South Wales will all receive funding.

Feasibility work will now commence for ScaleH2. Located in the Illawarra region of NSW (a historical steel-making area north of Sydney), ScaleH2 features a 1 GW hydrogen production facility, feeding an 800,000 tonnes-per-year ammonia plant. Both products will be exported to Germany, with the local steel industry also identified as a potential end-use application. Also involved in ScaleH2 is NSW Powerfuels, a government-backed research centre exploring Power-to-X opportunities for the Australian state.

HySupply delivers final report

HySupply’s Ammonia Analysis Tool allows users to model production costs for renewable ammonia in Australia, based on a number of inputs. Source: HySupply.
Click to enlarge. HySupply’s Ammonia Analysis Tool allows users to model production costs for renewable ammonia in Australia, based on a number of inputs. Source: HySupply.

Also in Australia-Germany news, this two-year investigation into a hydrogen & derivatives supply chain between the two countries delivered its final report this week. On behalf of its public/private consortium of organisations, the report authors have concluded that a significant opportunity exists for such a supply chain with few technical roadblocks, but that “fact finding” needs to quickly evolve into “fact making”. Australian exports projects need assistance to quickly scale-up from pilot phase to full operations, and a suite of issues (development of shared infrastructure at export/import locations, regulatory requirements, certification etc.) need to be addressed by key stakeholders.

You can download a full pdf of the final report here. In November last year the HySupply team also released an “Ammonia Analysis Tool” to model ammonia production costs from electrolytic hydrogen, renewable energy and the Haber Bosch process. Learn more here.

Australia, Netherlands to explore export supply chain

The two governments will collaborate to develop a hydrogen supply chain from Australia to Rotterdam. Building on the success of HySupply (the Port of Rotterdam authority was a member of the project consortium), the pair will work on policy, regulatory & certification, infrastructure, technology R&D, as well as safety & social license concerns for hydrogen and derivatives.