Category: Industrial

Indonesian nickel miner Merdeka Battery Materials (MBMA) and partners have signed definitive agreements to construct a high-pressure acid leach (HPAL) plant on the Morowali industrial park, Sulawesi. The unit will have a nameplate capacity of 90,000 t/a of contained nickel in mixed hydroxide precipitate (MHP). PT Sulawesi Nickel Cobalt (SLNC) will construct and operate the plant adjacent to the existing HPAL plant operated by PT Huayue Nickel Cobalt (HNC). SLNC will source and process laterite nickel ore through a 20 year commercial agreement with MBMA's SCM mine, starting from the commissioning date. An ore preparation plant will be built at the SCM mine to enable ore transportation via pipeline to the SLNC processing plant at IMIP. The total combined investment for constructing SLNC (including interest incurred during construction) is expected to be approximately $1.8 billion according to Merdeka. Construction of the project commenced in January 2025 and is expected to reach commissioning stage within 18 months.

KT-Kinetics technology has signed an $125 million engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning (EPCC) contract to build a hydrogen production unit at Petronas’ Pengerang Biorefinery, Malaysia. The hydrogen plan is expected to be operational by the second half of 2028, and will supply up to 38,000 normal m3 /h of hydrogen for the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and hydrogenated vegetable oil (HVO). NextChem will license its NX ReformTM technology for the unit. The new biorefinery will process approximately 650,000 t/a of raw materials such as used vegetable oils, animal fats and waste from the processing of vegetable oils to produce sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) and bio-naphtha.

Liquid Wind has announced the development of a new 100,000 t/a green methanol project in Örnsköldsvik, Sweden, in collaboration with local energy company Övik Energi. Övik Energi’s combined heat and power plant in Örnsköldsvik was due to be the site of Ørsted’s FlagshipONE project, which was slated to produce 55,000 t/a of green methanol from 2025. A final investment decision (FID) was made in late 2022 when Ørsted bought out Liquid Wind’s 55% stake in the project, but the Danish offshore wind company chose to discontinue FlagshipONE in August 2024.

UAE-based chemicals and transition fuels hub TA’ZIZ has awarded an engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contract worth $1.7 billion to engineering company Samsung E&A to build the UAE’s first methanol plant. The facility will be located at the Al Ruwais Industrial City in the western part of the emirate of Abu Dhabi. It is projected to produce 1.8 million t/a green methanol, powered by clean energy from the grid, with the plant scheduled for completion in 2028.

Gasgrid Finland Oy has awarded Worley a four-year framework agreement with an option for extension until 2032, to provide owners engineering services for Gasgrid’s hydrogen pipeline system development in Finland. This 1,100 km long hydrogen pipeline system is expected to link major hydrogen production and offtake centres across Finland and enable the development of hydrogen export routes to neighbouring markets. Gasgrid says that the planned hydrogen pipeline system will support cost-efficient, reliable and secure renewable energy market development for the Nordic countries and elsewhere in Europe. Worley will provide the OE services primarily through Worley’s offices in the Netherlands and Finland with support from the Global Integrated Delivery (GID) team in India.

Australia’s NH3 Clean Energy, formerly Hexagon Energy Materials, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Pilbara Ports Authority to explore options for the loading and export of 600,000 tonnes per annum (TPA) of clean ammonia from its flagship WAH2 project. The MoU is intended to establish operational arrangements and binding agreements supporting ammonia export from the project, covering ship loading for both export and bunkering customers. Ammonia would be transported from the WAH2 plant to the port of Dampier by a newbuild pipeline located in the existing infrastructure corridor and loaded onto ships at the port’s bulk liquids berth, subject to availability and commercial agreements.

Energy company Mabanaft says that it plans to convert four of its tanks at the Blumensand tank terminal in the Port of Hamburg over the next two years. The company’s aim is to facilitate the import of low-carbon methanol to northern Germany. Mabanaft expects demand for low carbon methanol to grow in future, both in the shipping and other transport sectors, as well as in the chemical industry.

Yara Clean Ammonia has signed a time-charter contract with Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Kaisha (NYK) for an ammonia-fuelled medium gas carrier, to be delivered in November 2026. Medium gas carriers are the most popular type of vessel for international shipping of ammonia, and Yara and NYK have been studying the possibilities of running them off ammonia fuel since 2021. Yara Clean Ammonia operates the largest global ammonia network with 15 ships and has, through Yara, access to 18 ammonia terminals and multiple ammonia production and consumption sites across the world. Yara says that use of an AFMGC will contribute to reducing GHG emissions from marine transportation and developing an ammonia supply chain by providing a more environment-friendly means of ammonia transport as demand grows for ammonia use in the power sector, for marine fuel, and the like.

Repsol has approved a historic €800 million investment in Ecoplanta, a pioneering project in Europe to transform urban waste into renewable fuels and circular products, adding a solution for reducing CO2 emissions in the transport sector, while at the same time promoting the circular economy. Located in Tarragona, the facility will be the first in Europe to produce methanol from municipal waste via a gasification process developed by Enerkem - a technology company in which Repsol is a partner – using waste that would otherwise end up in landfills or be incinerated.

Maire Group subsidiary MET Development, together with Eni and utility company Iren Ambiente, have started the permitting process for a renewable methanol and hydrogen plant at Eni’s refinery in Sannazzaro de’ Burgondi near Pavia. The plant will be developed using NextChem’s NX Circular™ technology, which allows the plant to convert waste by generating syngas, which is subsequently used to produce high quality sustainable fuels and chemicals. Once completed, the plant will be able to convert approximately 200,000 t/a of non-recyclable waste supplied by Iren’s waste management unit Iren Ambiente into synthesis gas. This will in turn be converted to produce up to 110,000 t/a of renewable methanol, as a potential fuel for decarbonisation of the maritime sector. It will also produce up to 1,500 t/a of hydrogen, which could be used in refinery processes, reducing CO2 emissions compared to fossil-generated hydrogen, or, alternatively, for sustainable mobility in road and rail transport. The plant will also recover 33,000 t/a of inert granulate, which can be used for the cement industry. The plant will use infrastructure and services already available at the refinery to optimise costs.