Harland & Wolff says it will open conversations with potential funders, after a study has confirmed hydrogen can be stored in the salt caverns at its Islandmagee gas storage facility and withdrawn to a hydrogen grid when required, with the cost of conversion around £168 million.
H&W said the Large-Scale Hydrogen Concept Study documents the work carried out in designing a concept to integrating hydrogen processing and storage at the storage facility. The company’s strategy is for a capacity offtake partner to use at least one of seven currently permitted salt caverns to store hydrogen combined with a suitably sized hydrogen compression and dehydration train in order to meet the gas quality parameters specified by a grid operator.
The report, produced by Atkins as part of the Ballylumford Power-to-X consortium, takes into account the existing natural gas design at the facility and the potential to utilise the site for the Ballylumford Power-to-X project. It also takes account of the existing subsurface design carried out during the natural gas design phase in 2018.
The pre-FEED outcomes found:
• Integrating hydrogen onto the Islandmagee Gas Storage Facility is technically feasible based on existing technologies.
• Additional capital expenditure required to integrate hydrogen compression, dehydration, and cooling into the facility would be approximately £168 million, with no incremental costs for drilling, leaching and creation of a salt cavern.
• Developing of the salt caverns for hydrogen would follow a similar methodology to that proposed with the existing design for the gas storage facility. Additional costs would need to be incurred and further operating protocols put in place for hydrogen venting around existing leaching and de-brining equipment.
• The Report found that re-use of planned natural gas plant facilities wherever possible to develop the hydrogen facilities would be economically and operationally prudent
Harland & Wolff said that the report’s findings “takes it one step further in future proofing the project and preparing it for the transition from a natural gas to a hydrogen led economy.”
The findings of this study will be shared with current and future counterparties “which will stimulate further detailed conversations on mechanisms to monetise the project.”