Officials sign the deal for the 2 GW electrolysis plant.

thyssenkrupp Uhde Chlorine Engineers, a key provider of engineering, procurement and construction services for electrochemical plants, says it has won a contract from leading industrial gases company Air Products to instal a more than 2 GW electrolysis plant for one of the world’s largest green hydrogen projects at Neom in Saudi Arabia.

A joint venture with Industrie De Nora, thyssenkrupp Uhde Chlorine Engineers is a world leader in technologies and comprehensive solutions for large-scale electrolysis plants.

Under this contract, thyssenkrupp will engineer, procure and fabricate the plant based on its large-scale 20 megawatt (MW) alkaline water electrolysis module.

Upon commissioning, Neom Green Hydrogen Company –which has Neom, Acwa Power and Air Products as the project partners – will operate the facility.

The company will produce hydrogen to be synthesised into carbon-free ammonia for export exclusively by Air Products for global markets.

Engineering and procurement activities have been initiated, and the start of production is scheduled for 2026, it says.

In July 2020, Air Products, together with Acwa Power and Neom, had signed an agreement for a world-scale green hydrogen-based ammonia production facility powered by renewable energy.

thyssenkrupp was selected by its strategic partner Air Products early in the project as technology supplier and has worked intensively on early engineering and project development.

The signing of the project contract is a key milestone of both companies’ joint effort over the past year to use their complementary technology, engineering and project execution strengths to develop green hydrogen production facilities.

The realisation of the project leverages thyssenkrupp’s large-scale technology supporting Air Products’ development of green hydrogen for sustainable transportation, chemicals and power generation.

Dr Samir J Serhan, Chief Operating Officer at Air Products, says: “This project milestone with thyssenkrupp furthers our strong progress at Neom to deliver carbon-free hydrogen on a massive-scale in the kingdom and for the world. The development and execution of this innovative megaproject is one of many required to drive a successful energy transition, and we look forward to continuing to develop, build, own and operate facilities that help address the world’s significant energy and environmental challenges. This project is the kick-off to become a frontrunner in the green hydrogen economy.”

Denis Krude, CEO of thyssenkrupp Uhde Chlorine Engineers, says: “As a world market leader in electrolysis, we bring in two decisive factors to realise such gigawatt projects: With our large-scale standard module size and gigawatt cell manufacturing capacity per year together with our joint venture partner De Nora we are able to deliver large capacity projects today.

“With this gigawatt project, we are committed to invest into ramping up our manufacturing capacities further. We also aim for a strong local set-up which is key to delivering customised service solutions throughout the entire plant life-cycle.”