Highlights
World Energy eyes FID for Newfoundland plant in late 2023
On-site construction started for Nova Scotia project
Newfoundland and Labrador-based World Energy is aiming to take a final investment decision by late 2023 for its plans to build what it terms Canada's first commercial green hydrogen/ammonia production facility, which will use power from wind projects in the province, a senior company official said May 30.
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"In terms of our next milestones, we are looking at the permitting process in the fall of 2023, with first production of green hydrogen in 2025," Managing Director Sean Leet said at the Energy NL Conference & Exhibition 2023 in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador.
Called Project Nujioqonik, the planned facility will be at Bay St. George in western Newfoundland and will have a capacity of 250,000 mt/year of green hydrogen, which will be converted to produce 1.2 million mt/year of green ammonia, Leet said.
At present, the plan is to generate 3 GW of renewable electricity through wind projects using electrolyzers, he said, adding that around mid-May the company's initiative attracted the attention of two South Korea entities -- Skecoplant and SKecoengineering -- which together unveiled an $50 million investment for the planned project in Newfoundland.
Separately, early construction work has started for a green hydrogen and ammonia project at Point Tupper in neighboring Nova Scotia, developer EverWind Fuels said at the same conference May 30.
The facility is targeted to start production in 2025, making it the second green hydrogen facility to be commissioned in that single year in Atlantic Canada, Vice President Sam Imbeult said, noting the company plans multi-phase development of its facility.
The first phase is permitted and set to produce and export 200,000 MT/year of green hydrogen that will increase to 1 million MT/year the following year, according to information on the EverWind Fuels website.
The development of new green hydrogen and ammonia projects in Newfoundland and Labrador comes on the back of an agreement the province signed early May with the Port of Rotterdam in the Netherlands to develop mutual opportunities, the provincial energy minister, Andrew Parsons, said at the conference May 30.
Europe is a key export market for Newfoundland, and the target is to work in tandem with the Port of Rotterdam, which is seeking to position itself as a green hydrogen hub for northwestern Europe through major infrastructure investments in green hydrogen production and distribution and port upgrades to accommodate green hydrogen imports, Parsons said.
"We have never been in a better place for opportunities as we are now," Parsons said, adding that besides the Rotterdam port deal, Canada and Germany have also signed an alliance agreement in August 2022 for the latter to import green hydrogen/ammonia from Atlantic Canada.
Canada has "spectacular" opportunities for the energy transition and for emerging as a major supplier to Europe, but for new investments there will be a need for predictability and remaining competitive, Christine Healy, a senior vice president with TotalEnergies, said at the conference.
"Canada also has to think of the [regulatory] approval processes," Healy said. "It is a complex jurisdiction with political discretion. We need to fix this."