Enegix Energy unveils Brazil green hydrogen project

Australian renewable energy company Enegix Energy has unveiled the Base One green hydrogen project in cooperation with the State Government of Ceará in Brazil, marking an investment of US$5.4 billion. 

Under the terms of the recent MoU signed with the state governor Camilo Santana, Enegix will set up the world’s largest green hydrogen plant that will produce over 600 million kgs of green hydrogen per year from already contracted 3.4GW of combined baseload wind and solar power through a partnership with Enerwind. The project is expected to take 3-4 years to build.  

Base One will be established in the state of Ceará, northeast of Brazil and will provide a strategic location for Enegix’s renewable hydrogen production with direct access to all major international markets via ocean freight. 

A 500-hectare plot of commercial land has been scoped in the Port of Pecém, a world-class deepsea port with established infrastructure and access to the required quantities of water - to enable the electrolysis process to separate hydrogen and oxygen elements. 

Enegix’s planned next-generation facility will be run completely using renewable energy with zero emissions and will harness the great renewable energy potential that Ceará has available with solar and onshore and offshore wind to be realised allowing Base One to be expanded to over 100GW to meet global demand. 

Wesley Cooke, Founder and CEO, said its partnership with the Ceará State Government will turn Ceará into a major hydrogen export location and establish Enegix as a global renewable power producer, aligning with its vision and strategy to replace expensive, high emission power grids with renewable, baseload, and cost-effective zero-carbon grids. 

"Through this partnership, we plan to create a new model of sustainable energy for the world’s fast-growing population while reducing dependency and cutting end-user costs on high carbon-emitting fuel sources like diesel," he said. 

Base One has the potential to reduce annual CO2e emissions by 10 million tons per year and would become "the single largest carbon emission reduction project in the world," according to a statement.

In other global developments: 

• Portugal is targeting green hydrogen production by the end of 2022 and already has private investment worth around 10 billion euros ($12 billion) lined up for eight projects.
• Mainstream Renewable Power and Norway’s Aker Clean Hydrogen are partnering on the production of green hydrogen and low cost ammonia in Chile. 
• The H2 Green Steel industrial initiative, backed by EIT InnoEnergy and Spotify co-founder Daniel Ek, aims to build the world’s first large-scale steel production plant powered by green hydrogen, in north Sweden.
• CMB, ITOCHU and Nippon Coke & Engineering Company are setting up a company focusing on local hydrogen production for consumption on the northern island of Kyushu, Japan. 
• Plug Power and SK Group have announced the completion of $1.6 billion capital investment to partner in accelerating hydrogen as an alternative energy source in Asian markets.
• Plug Power has also signed an MoU with Acciona to launch a 50-50 JV headquartered in Madrid.  
• Italian utility Enel has agreed with Saras to develop a project to supply green hydrogen to the Italian refiner’s Sarroch site in Sardinia.