Air Liquide and TotalEnergies to invest more than €1bn in green hydrogen

French oil firm TotalEnergies will develop two green hydrogen projects with industrial gases company Air Liquide, aiming to help decarbonise Total's Dutch and Belgian refineries, they said on Tuesday.

The two projects to build electrolysers represent a combined investment of more than €1bn (R19.17bn) and will cut CO2 emissions from TotalEnergies' refineries by up to 450,000 tonnes annually, the companies said.

When produced using renewable electricity and through the electrolysis of water — rather than by stripping it from natural gas and releasing CO2 — hydrogen is a greener fuel as it leaves only water and oxygen as byproducts when burnt.

This is leading many European governments to include the fuel in plans to replace oil or natural gas in their economies by 2050.

However, high costs and uncertain demand have led many energy companies to freeze projects and pull back investment.

TotalEnergies CEO Patrick Pouyanne has said he would continue to use renewable hydrogen as a feedstock in Total's refineries to reduce net CO2 emissions, though he is reluctant to expand the hydrogen refuelling station fleet from trucks to serving passenger cars before sufficient demand shows it is worthwhile financially.

The first joint project, a 200MW electrolyser in Rotterdam, will be supplied by TotalEnergies’ wind farms off the Dutch coast and will start operating from the end of 2027, Total said.

It represents a global investment of about €600m (R11.5bn) for both companies, which have made subsidy requests under European and national programmes.

Air Liquide and Total will also establish a joint venture to build a 250MW electrolyser project in the Zeeland province of the Netherlands.