Together with Equinor and TotalEnergies, bp reached the financial close for the Northern Endurance Partnership (NEP) and Net Zero Teesside Power (NZT Power), which are set to play a pivotal role in the hydrogen network of the East Coast Cluster (ECC).
However, the 1.2GW blue hydrogen project H2Teesside, which will use NEP to store CO2, has not reached FID yet, and it will instead enter into a six-month examination period.
Hearing for the examination phase will take place on January 13, 14 and 15, 2025, allowing anyone who has registered to have their say on the development of the project ahead of the 28 February deadline.
NEP, the bp (45%), Equinor (45%) and TotalEnergies (10%) joint venture (JV), will be the CO2 transportation and storage provider for both the ECC development and H2Teesside.
The separate JV with Equinor (25%), NZT Power, could generate up to 742MW of low-carbon power from a gas-fired power station and capture up to two million tonnes of CO2 per year, which will then be transported to secure subsea sites beneath the North Sea via NEP to help power the UK national grid.
H2 View understands that project construction for NEP and NZT Power will begin next year, with start-up anticipated for 2028.
“This investment launches a new era for clean energy in Britain,” claimed UK Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, “Boosting energy security, backing industries and supporting thousands of highly skilled jobs in Teesside and the North East.
“This is the government’s mission to make the UK a clean energy superpower in action – replacing Britain’s energy insecurity with homegrown clean power that rebuilds the strength of our industrial heartlands.”
The UK Government committed almost £22bn ($28.9bn) of funding over 25 years to the two CCS projects in October 2024, one in Teesside and the other in Merseyside. They will have a combined carbon capture capacity of 8.5 million tonnes per year.
Felipe Arbelaez, bp’s Senior Vice President, added, “The progress of these projects to financial close is a demonstration of the power of the private and public sectors coming together to deliver integrated low-carbon energy projects.
“The projects further demonstrate bp’s focused and value-driven strategy for hydrogen and CCS – delivered together with our partners while maintaining our disciplined capital-light model.”
Last February, bp selected BASF’s carbon capture technology to use at H2Teesside, which boasts a carbon capture rate of up to 99,999%.
