On Wednesday 21^st October, we hosted our 3^rd Industrial Decarbonisation Network, with over 35 delegates in attendance, both in person and online.

The meeting provides a platform, each quarter, for companies to network and engage with subjects that are pertinent to the Decarbonisation agenda.  David Talbot, CEO CATCH, opened the meeting, and introduced the networks first speaker, Claire Thornhill, from Frontier Economics, who set the scene and shared details of the project they have been working on with BEIS – Business Models for Hydrogen Production.  With an objective of focusing on large scale hydrogen production in the near term (2020s) whilst considering the characteristics of the production technologies and the markets.  Claire explained that their research identified 4 key priorities for the sector – Technology Specific Support, Transfer demand risk away from investors, reduce the risk of policy change and allow reduction in support for successive investments. Claire went on to explain their recommended solutions and structures of producer’s subsidiary models, including premium payments and revenue stabilisation structures plus models with a fixed / variable split – with the conclusion that split models look promising at this stage.

Next David introduced Ian Livingston, from Equinor, who gave updates from the Zero Carbon Humber project – a bid of £75 Million has been submitted to the Industrial Clusters Mission, which is backed by the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund – to provide the infrastructure to develop a carbon Capture and storage pipe line across the Humber region. Next Ian explained the H2H Saltend project, which will be one of the first in the UK to utilize the infrastructure put in place by the Zero Carbon Project by switching the chemicals park to 100% hydrogen by 2030. Therefore, achieving Decarbonisation targets whilst helping Saltend Chemicals Park Companies to produce greener products.

Katie Hedges, who leads the CATCH Industrial Decarbonisation Network, closed the meeting by providing an update of the Humber Industrial Cluster Plan – The plan will set out a route map to decarbonising the energy intensive industries such as steel, refining and chemicals within the Humber Cluster, whilst providing a platform and support for all the deployment projects in the region. The work is due to commence in January, once the project has been approved by the government.

Katie invited group members to sign up to the new CATCH Industrial Decarbonisation Mailing list, to receive invites to meetings and to be kept up to date with projects. You can sign up here.

Date of next meeting – 27^th January 2021.