INSIGHT: Houston, the US petchem hub, chosen to become hydrogen hub

HOUSTON (ICIS)–A US programme chose Houston as one of its seven hubs to produce low-carbon hydrogen, meaning that it could one day supply the material to petrochemical and fuel plants on the Gulf Coast, allowing them to lower their carbon emissions.

• Houston’s Gulf Coast Hydrogen Hub, called HyVelocity, will receive up to $1.2bn under the US Department of Energy’s hydrogen hub programme.
• The Houston hub will be administered by GTI Energy, and it includes the industrial partners AES, Air Liquide, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Mitsubishi Power Americas, Orsted and Sempra Infrastructure.
• Houston is already a major hydrogen production centre. It and the larger Gulf Coast have a network of 48 hydrogen plants and over 1,000 miles (1,600km) of hydrogen pipelines. The region represents the world’s largest concentration of hydrogen infrastructure.

IMPACT FOR HOUSTON AND GULF COAST CHEMICALS
Houston’s role as one of the world’s largest refining and petrochemical hubs means that the hydrogen hub could help the industry reduce its emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and become an international source of low-carbon products as well as blue and green hydrogen.

PROCESS HEAT
Crackers and other industrial plants could use hydrogen from the hub as a low-carbon source of process heat.

Dow is building such a cracker in Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta province, Canada that will use hydrogen as a fuel and eliminate nearly all of its CO2 emissions.

Dow could retrofit its other light steam crackers, allowing them to do the same.

FEEDSTOCK
Refineries could use hydrogen as a feedstock for fuel production, lowering the carbon footprint of traditional oil products.

The same goes for plants that make renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). These rely on hydrogen to remove oxygen from vegetable oils, animal fats and waste greases.

Blue and green hydrogen can be used to produce methanol, which could be exported, used as a feedstock or burned as a fuel.

LyondellBasell has a refinery in Houston that could use the hub’s hydrogen and potentially become a sustainability hub. Existing refining units at the site could process natural oils to produce renewable diesel, SAF and renewable naphtha.

The naphtha could be shipped via pipeline to the company’s nearby cracker complex in Channelview to produce renewable olefins and renewable plastics.

LyondellBasell is still exploring options for the refinery.

E-FUELS
Methanol can also be produced by combining green hydrogen with CO2. Existing process technology can convert methanol into gasoline, diesel and jet fuel. These are called eFuels because they are made with electricity.

HIF Global plans to build an eFuels project in Matagorda County, Texas, that would produce around 200m gal/year of eFuels by 2027.

Future eFuels plants could make use of the hub’s hydrogen.

Texas recently revived a tax break that could make it even easier to build plants that would consume the hydrogen from the HyVelocity hub.

Several renewable projects took advantage of the programme before it lapsed in 2022.

EXPORT HUB
Houston could become an export hub for ammonia, which could become the main way to export hydrogen overseas.

STORING RENEWABLE ENERGY
Texas produces enormous amounts of renewable power through its solar panels and wind turbines. It is difficult to store renewable power when an excess is produced.

Mitsubishi Power has argued that excess renewable power could be stored in the form of green hydrogen in underground caverns.

Houston and the rest of the Gulf Coast has an abundance of such caverns. When the region has a shortage of energy, that stored hydrogen can be blended with natural gas and burned in power plants.

Mitsubishi is developing turbines that can burn such blends. A blend of 20% hydrogen was successfully burned at a power plant in Georgia. Mitsubishi Power turbines will be used to initially burn 30% hydrogen blends at the Intermountain Power Plant (IPP) in Delta, Utah.

SUPPORTING PARTNERS
The hub in Houston has more than 90 supporting partners that include some significant players in the chemical and energy industries, as shown in the following list:

• Asahi Kasei
• Baker Hughes
• Energy Transfer
• Evonik
• Jacobs
• LG Chem
• LyondellBasell
• McDermott
• ONEOK
• Phillips 66
• PIC
• Repsol
• Siemens Energy
• Shell
• Trillium
• thyssenkrupp Nucera

COMMENTS FROM COMPANIES

• Katie Ellet, president of Hydrogen Energy & Mobility, North America, Air Liquide:
  “As a founding member of HyVelocity, we are committed to using this federal investment to expedite the hydrogen market by leveraging our expertise across the hydrogen value chain and optimising the assets of the Gulf Coast,” she said. “This investment represents a pivotal step in decarbonising our planet and revolutionising mobility, serving as a powerful example of successful public-private partnerships in scaling up hydrogen and advancing the energy transition.”
• Austin Knight, vice president of hydrogen, Chevron New Energies:
  “As one of the seven industry members of HyVelocity, Chevron is pleased to be part of this public-private partnership to advance a hydrogen hub that supports a lower carbon future,” he said. “Chevron is pursuing commercial opportunities through partnerships demonstrating our desire to develop technology, build infrastructure and connect supply chains to deliver real-world hydrogen applications for customers.”
• Mark Klewpatinond, hydrogen global business manager, ExxonMobil:
  “If the world is going to make progress toward net-zero emissions, governments, universities and companies need to work together to accelerate the development and deployment of critical solutions such as low carbon hydrogen,” he said. “We look forward to helping HyVelocity Hub further advance hydrogen deployment across the Gulf Coast using our extensive experience.”
• Chris Cain, senior vice president of net zero transition at LyondellBasell:
  “Use of hydrogen as an energy source is one of the ways we can reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, while creating solutions for everyday sustainable living,” he said. “Government funding is needed to accelerate the development of hydrogen production, infrastructure capacity, and transition to low carbon fuels in manufacturing. We look forward to contributing to the success of the HyVelocity Hub and bringing the benefits of clean hydrogen and good jobs to the Gulf Coast.”

Insight article by Al Greenwood

Thumbnail shows a truck carrying hydrogen. Image by Shutterstock