State oil and gas firm QatarEnergy and South Korea’s Hydrogen Convergence Alliance have signed an agreement to cooperate on expanding hydrogen supply chains.

The agreement is intended to provide a framework for the development of the sector in both countries and will involve cooperation on technology development.

The Hydrogen Convergence Alliance (H2Korea) is a public-private partnership established by the Korean government in 2017 to promote and develop the hydrogen industry in the country.

QatarEnergy—formerly  known as Qatar Petroleum—signed an agreement with Shell earlier this month to work together on blue and green hydrogen projects in the UK.

Both Saudi Arabia and the UAE are aggressively pursuing hydrogen but until this month Qatar—the world’s second-largest LNG exporter—had not made any moves into the sector.

But the firm is now looking to expand its LNG partnerships into the hydrogen industry, according to QatarEnergy CEO Saad al-Kaabi.

“We are pleased to sign this agreement on hydrogen to expand our strong relations into new horizons of cleaner energy including our long-established strategic partnership in the field of liquefied natural gas,” he says.

“We believe hydrogen has an important role to play in the energy transition towards an affordable, reliable and clean energy system, but only if relevant competent entities, such as QatarEnergy and H2Korea, join hands to achieve this goal.”

Roadmap for hydrogen

South Korea announced its Hydrogen Economy Roadmap in January 2019. The plans outline a goal of producing 6.2mn fuel cell electric vehicles and constructing at least 1,200 refilling stations by 2040.

The plan aims to roll out 35 hydrogen buses in 2019, 2,000 by 2022 and 41,000 by 2040.

It also outlines an objective to supply 15GW of fuel cells for power generation by 2040.

Mining and metals firm BHP and South Korean steelmaker Posco are undertaking trials to use hydrogen-based direct reduction technology to reduce the carbon intensity of the steelmaking process.

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Author: Tom Young