Oil and gas exploration and production company Neptune Energy is helping the Dutch energy system transition to a lower-carbon future.
For this, the company has during the summer announced one of its gas platforms – powered by green energy from shore – would be used to produce hydrogen, as part of a pilot project commissioned by NexStep, the Dutch Association for Decommissioning and Re-Use, and TNO, the Netherlands Organisation for applied scientific research.
A megawatt electrolyzer will be placed within a sea container and installed on Neptune’s Q13a-A platform, located near the Dutch coast, 13 kilometers from shore.
The platform will convert seawater to demineralized water and use green electricity to produce hydrogen. Due to begin production later in 2021, the pilot will provide the participants with the opportunity to develop their experience of producing hydrogen in an offshore environment.
During the project, the fluctuations in offshore wind electricity production will be simulated, as the intention is to eventually use the electricity produced from offshore wind turbines to produce hydrogen. This would solve the problem of the onshore grid overload, intermittent offshore electricity production, and the expensive subsea electricity cables, as hydrogen could be shipped via the existing offshore gas infrastructure.
Now the partners in the project have released an explainer video to show how electricity produced by offshore wind turbines can be converted into molecules and then shipped further on. See below:
Also, Lex de Groot, managing director of Neptune Energy Netherlands, recently spoke to Navingo about the purpose and benefits of reusing existing platforms for the acceleration of energy transition.
“We want to reuse platforms because it accelerates and facilitates the energy transition. The stuff is out there, the platforms are out there, the pipelines are out there.
“We can remove them, we are willing of course to remove them, we take our responsibility but if it can be reused, it’s more efficient to do it and it will make the energy transition faster,” de Groot said.
“Gas will play an important role for decades to come. For the Netherlands and for the world. The gas that we need for this period can be produced from the Dutch offshore.
“Using these gas reserves still to be found, a 100 billion cubic meters according to TNO. By using this, it will allow us to prepare the infrastructure for what comes next in the energy transition. So, for hydrogen generation, for CO2 storage or electrification purposes,” he added.