Firm hails ‘major advance’ towards making fuel produced using renewable energy viable for large vehicles
Boris Johnson and JCB chairman Lord Bamford unveil a hydrogen-powered JCB in October 2021. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA
Miles Brignall
Sun 31 Oct 2021 13.16 GMT
The construction equipment maker JCB has signed a multibillion-pound deal to import and supply hydrogen produced using renewable energy.
As the Cop26 climate conference got under way in Glasgow, the company announced a deal with Australia’s Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) that will allow it to start selling “green” gas through a specialist division, Ryze Hydrogen, from early next year.
Hydrogen does not produce carbon dioxide when burned and so is considered an alternative option for heavy industries as the world seeks to wean itself burning fossil fuels. It already powers buses in many countries – including in the UK – and could power trucks, trains and other highly energy-consuming vehicles including aircraft – areas that are currently considered difficult to decarbonise.
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FFI’s green hydrogen is produced from 100% renewable sources but still requires significant energy to produce.
JCB’s chairman, Anthony Bamford, whose company Wrightbus built the world’s first hydrogen double-decker bus, said the deal was an important step towards getting greener energy to commercial customers.
“It’s fine having an engine powered by green hydrogen, but no good if customers can’t get green hydrogen to fuel their machines,” he said. “This is a major advance on the road towards making green hydrogen a viable solution. We want the government to show its commitment to the sector by investing in buses, trains, trucks, ships, aircraft and the entire green hydrogen supply chain.”
FFI’s chairman, Andrew Forrest, said the deal would help the UK achieve its net zero targets, particularly in hard-to-electrify sectors. “The reduction in greenhouse gas emissions associated with replacing fossil fuel with only 2m tonnes of green hydrogen is the equivalent of taking over 8m cars off the road – almost a quarter of the UK’s entire fleet.”
The business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, has previously said low-carbon hydrogen has a critical role to play in the UK’s transition to net zero. Trials have been ongoing to see whether it can be used to heat the nation’s homes. It is an attractive option as much of the existing gas network can be utilised.
However, producing it using renewable electricity is less efficient than using that electricity as a direct power source. In recent weeks ministers have been talking up air source heat pumps instead, suggesting hydrogen may be better used in hard-to-decarbonise sectors such as transport.
Miles Brignall
Sun 31 Oct 2021 13.16 GMT
The construction equipment maker JCB has signed a multibillion-pound deal to import and supply hydrogen produced using renewable energy.
As the Cop26 climate conference got under way in Glasgow, the company announced a deal with Australia’s Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) that will allow it to start selling “green” gas through a specialist division, Ryze Hydrogen, from early next year.
Hydrogen does not produce carbon dioxide when burned and so is considered an alternative option for heavy industries as the world seeks to wean itself burning fossil fuels. It already powers buses in many countries – including in the UK – and could power trucks, trains and other highly energy-consuming vehicles including aircraft – areas that are currently considered difficult to decarbonise.
Advertisement
FFI’s green hydrogen is produced from 100% renewable sources but still requires significant energy to produce.
JCB’s chairman, Anthony Bamford, whose company Wrightbus built the world’s first hydrogen double-decker bus, said the deal was an important step towards getting greener energy to commercial customers.
“It’s fine having an engine powered by green hydrogen, but no good if customers can’t get green hydrogen to fuel their machines,” he said. “This is a major advance on the road towards making green hydrogen a viable solution. We want the government to show its commitment to the sector by investing in buses, trains, trucks, ships, aircraft and the entire green hydrogen supply chain.”
FFI’s chairman, Andrew Forrest, said the deal would help the UK achieve its net zero targets, particularly in hard-to-electrify sectors. “The reduction in greenhouse gas emissions associated with replacing fossil fuel with only 2m tonnes of green hydrogen is the equivalent of taking over 8m cars off the road – almost a quarter of the UK’s entire fleet.”
The business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, has previously said low-carbon hydrogen has a critical role to play in the UK’s transition to net zero. Trials have been ongoing to see whether it can be used to heat the nation’s homes. It is an attractive option as much of the existing gas network can be utilised.
However, producing it using renewable electricity is less efficient than using that electricity as a direct power source. In recent weeks ministers have been talking up air source heat pumps instead, suggesting hydrogen may be better used in hard-to-decarbonise sectors such as transport.
Fortescue to Supply Green Hydrogen to U.K. After Deal With JCB
By James Ludden
BLOOMBERG
October 30, 2021
Australia’s Fortescue Future Industries will become the biggest supplier of green hydrogen to the U.K. after signing a deal with construction equipment company JC Bamford Excavators Ltd. and distributor Ryze Hydrogen.
The deal, signed on the eve of the COP26 summit in Glasgow, Scotland, unites two of the industrial world’s highest-profile billionaires, JCB founder and chairman Anthony Bamford and Australia’s Fortescue Metals Group Ltd. founder Andrew Forrest. Jo Bamford, Anthony’s son, is chairman of Ryze.
The agreement could bolster Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s case that the U.K. can make good on its target for net-zero emissions by 2050. And for Forrest, the deal goes a small way to helping his company meet an annual target of 15 million metric tons of green hydrogen production by 2030, rising to 50 million tons in the following decade.
“Our agreement signals the first major shift in the global commercial landscape from fossil fuels towards the real, practical, implementable solution that is green hydrogen,” Forrest said in a statement Sunday. Some of the production will eventually be in the U.K.
October 30, 2021
Australia’s Fortescue Future Industries will become the biggest supplier of green hydrogen to the U.K. after signing a deal with construction equipment company JC Bamford Excavators Ltd. and distributor Ryze Hydrogen.
The deal, signed on the eve of the COP26 summit in Glasgow, Scotland, unites two of the industrial world’s highest-profile billionaires, JCB founder and chairman Anthony Bamford and Australia’s Fortescue Metals Group Ltd. founder Andrew Forrest. Jo Bamford, Anthony’s son, is chairman of Ryze.
The agreement could bolster Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s case that the U.K. can make good on its target for net-zero emissions by 2050. And for Forrest, the deal goes a small way to helping his company meet an annual target of 15 million metric tons of green hydrogen production by 2030, rising to 50 million tons in the following decade.
“Our agreement signals the first major shift in the global commercial landscape from fossil fuels towards the real, practical, implementable solution that is green hydrogen,” Forrest said in a statement Sunday. Some of the production will eventually be in the U.K.
MORE ON THE DASH TO GREEN ENERGY:
Billionaire Miner Sees Next Fortune in Rush for Clean Energy
U.K. Sets Out Sweeping Plan to Bring Economy to Net Zero
Jo Bamford on Hydrogen and the Future of Green Energy
Forrest, who told Bloomberg TV this month that hydrogen would rival coal as a key part of steelmaking within a decade, has set a 2040 net-zero target for Fortescue’s customers.
JCB signs green hydrogen deal worth billions
Sun, October 31, 2021
A general view of the JCB World Part Centre Warehouse in Uttoxeter, England
Construction equipment maker JCB has signed a deal to buy billions of pounds of green hydrogen, defined as hydrogen produced using renewable energy.
The deal means JCB will take 10% of the green hydrogen made by the Australian firm Fortescue Future Industries (FFI).
FFI said the deal was a "first-of-a-kind partnership" that would see it become the UK's largest supplier of the clean fuel.
Production, mostly done outside the UK, is expected to begin early next year.
JCB and a firm called Ryze Hydrogen would then distribute it in the UK.
Lord Anthony Bamford, chairman of JCB, said the deal would help to make green hydrogen a viable solution, telling the BBC it was "the right thing to do".
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Hydrogen does not produce carbon emissions when it is burned, so is considered a likely replacement for fossil fuels in heavy industries such as shipping and steel and cement-making.
Lord Bamford has also called on the government to invest in hydrogen-fuelled forms of transport such as buses, trains and aircraft.
In a statement, he said: "It's fine having an engine powered by green hydrogen, but no good if customers can't get green hydrogen to fuel their machines.
"This is a major advance on the road towards making green hydrogen a viable solution."
'Critical role'
Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng has said low carbon hydrogen has a critical role to play in the UK's transition to net zero - that is balancing the amount of greenhouse gas produced and the amount removed from the atmosphere.
In the government's UK Hydrogen Strategy, the business secretary argues the UK's "infrastructure and technical know-how make us ideally positioned to be a global leader in hydrogen".
However, he has previously admitted its production, and use, would have to rapidly increase for the government's ambitions to be achieved.
Lord Bamford's son and entrepreneur Jo Bamford also owns Wrightbus, which built the world's first hydrogen double decker
Robert Buckley, an energy analyst at Cornwall Insights, said: "Hydrogen has the potential to be a very important energy source for heavy transport and industry."
But he pointed out that Australia, where the hydrogen for the JCB deal will largely be produced, has more solar electricity resources than the UK, as well as an established gas export industry.
He said that could give other countries, such as Australia, "an early advantage" while hydrogen production in the UK became more established.
Analysis box by Katy Austin, Business correspondent
Ministers think low carbon hydrogen has a critical role to play in the transition to net zero.
The goal is 5 gigawatts of production capacity by 2030. However, the Business Secretary admits production and usage would have to be ramped up fast for that to be met.
And when the government's UK Hydrogen Strategy was published in August, the trade association RenewableUK said it didn't focus enough on developing the UK's green hydrogen industry - meaning production that uses renewable energy, not natural gas.
The new agreement involves importing green hydrogen from abroad, made by a subsidiary of Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest's Fortescue Mining Group.
One energy analyst said that such deals could mean that the technology becomes commercial quicker, and firms themselves take it up more quickly. That's clearly the hope for two hydrogen-enthusiastic businessmen.
JCB, based in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, also announced earlier this month that it was spending £100m on a project to produce "super efficient hydrogen engines" to power its machinery.
This latest deal ties in billionaire Lord Bamford and JCB with FFI, which is the newer renewables subsidiary of mining giant Fortescue Metals Group, owned by Andrew Forrest.
Lord Bamford's son, entrepreneur Jo Bamford, is also founder of Ryze Hydrogen, which is building the UK's first network of green hydrogen production plants.
Mr Bamford is also the chairman and owner of Wrightbus, which built the UK's first hydrogen double decker.
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