India's Essar sets up joint venture to build UK's largest hydrogen hub

India’s diversified conglomerate Essar and UK’s Progressive Energy have announced a joint venture that will build the UK’s largest hydrogen hub at an estimated cost of one billion pounds at the Stanlow Manufacturing Complex.  

Led by Essar as the majority shareholder, Vertex Hydrogen Limited has been formed to provide the catalyst for development of a hydrogen economy across north-west England and North Wales, as a central part of the HyNet decarbonisation cluster, the company said in a statement.

“A total investment of approximately 1 billion pounds will be committed to deliver the hydrogen production hub,” Essar said.

Sitting at the heart of the HyNet low carbon cluster, Essar Stanlow will be the UK’s first low carbon hydrogen facility and aim to produce a total of 1GW per year of hydrogen across two units, from 2026 – enough to cover the domestic heating energy used by Liverpool.

“Essar is massively committed to investing in energy transition and is building a portfolio of companies in this space. Vertex Hydrogen is a central component of that vision, which will be instrumental in helping create a hydrogen future for north-west England and north-east Wales,” Prashant Ruia, Essar Chairman, said in a statement.

Waste fuel gasses from Essar Stanlow, along with natural gas, will be converted by Vertex Hydrogen into hydrogen, with carbon dioxide safely captured and stored by HyNet partner Eni, underground offshore in Liverpool Bay.

The hydrogen production hub will provide low carbon energy to replace fossil fuels in industries across the HyNet region, as well as be used for heating homes, and fuelling buses, trains and trucks.