Essar Oil UK announces the selection of the final key licensor technology provider, Elessent Clean Technologies’ BELCO^® gas cleaning technology for the planned EET Industrial Carbon Capture facility based at Stanlow, UK.

This is another pivotal step towards Essar Oil UK’s $1.2 billion investments in decarbonising the refinery by reducing ~2 million tons of CO₂ (95%) emissions, making it the world’s first low carbon refinery and world’s first low carbon fuel producer.

Deepak Maheshwari, CEO of Essar Oil UK, said: “It’s great to have our final licensor technology provider in place as we move into the next phase of our decarbonisation strategy. With an investment of $1.2 billion, Essar Oil UK is positioned to be the world’s first low carbon refinery. Elessent Clean Technologies is a valuable partner in our plan to reduce our refinery emissions by 95% using the BELCO^® scrubbing technology.

Essar’s overall decarbonisation strategy aims to reduce refinery emissions with 2 state-of-the-art projects:

• Industrial carbon capture announced at Stanlow in November 2022 and planned to be operational by 2028. The project will result in an annual reduction of ~1 million tons of CO₂
• Hydrogen fuel switching involves switching from natural gas and other refinery fuel sources to hydrogen as a fuel, resulting in an annual reduction of ~1 million tons of CO₂

This investment ensures that Essar Oil UK will continue to operate sustainably, contributing to the North West’s economic well-being and playing a crucial role in securing UK energy security and resilience.

With the selection of Elessent Clean Technologies, Essar Oil UK has onboarded all its key technology partners and the development of the basic engineering design packages (BEDP) for the licensed technologies is being progressed. This is an essential milestone during the front-end engineering design (FEED) phase of the project.

Essar Oil UK announces the selection of a second key licensor technology provider, Topsoe, for the planned EET Industrial Carbon Capture (“ICC”) facility based at Stanlow, UK. Topsoe will provide its sustainable flue-gas treatment technology SNOX^TM.

This is a pivotal step towards Essar Oil UK’s $1.2 billion investment in decarbonising the refinery by reducing ~2 million tons of CO₂ (95%) emissions, making it the world’s first low carbon refinery and a producer of low carbon fuels. 

Deepak Maheshwari, CEO of Essar Oil UK, said:

“We are ready to move into the next phase of Essar Oil UK’s decarbonisation strategy.  With an investment of $1.2 billion, Essar Oil UK is positioned to be the world’s first low carbon refinery. The industrial carbon capture facility, combined with our upcoming hydrogen fuel switching project, will reduce the refinery’s CO₂ emissions by 95%. Topsoe is a valuable partner in this endeavour. With Topsoe SNOX™ technology we are getting a well proven and highly sustainable flue-gas treatment.”

Essar’s overall decarbonisation strategy plans to reduce refinery emissions with two state-of-the-art projects:

• Industrial carbon capture (ICC) announced at Stanlow in November 2022, aims to be operational by 2028. The project will result in an annual emissions reduction of ~1 million tons of CO₂
• Hydrogen fuel switching from natural gas to hydrogen as fuel source, resulting in an annual emissions reduction of ~1 million tons of CO₂

This puts Essar Oil UK at the forefront of the UK’s energy transition by producing the UK’s first low carbon fuels, securing the refinery’s vital ongoing role in UK energy security and resilience.

With the selection of Topsoe and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Essar Oil UK has identified most of its technology partners and is ready to progress to the front-end engineering design (“FEED”) phase of the project. Development of the basic engineering design packages (BEDP) for the licensed technologies is already ongoing.

• Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd (MHI) selected as technology licensor for the carbon dioxide capture section of the plant, a key element of the proposed EET Industrial Carbon Capture facility at Stanlow.
• Demonstrates Essar’s commitment to meeting its ambition to become the UK’s first low carbon refinery.
• Enables progression to the front-end engineering design (“FEED”) phase of the project in Q4 2023.

Essar Oil UK Limited (EOUK), the leading integrated downstream energy company, announces that it has completed the selection of a key licensor technology provider and signed a contract for the development of the required basic engineering design package for its new EET Industrial Carbon Capture facility based at Stanlow, UK.  This is a leading use of carbon capture technology, associated with a fluid catalytic cracker within refineries globally.

Following a detailed due diligence process, technology provider MHI has been selected for the carbon dioxide capture process section of the plant.  Once captured, the carbon dioxide will be permanently sequestered into depleted gas fields under the sea in Liverpool Bay, as part of the HyNet cluster in the North West of England.

Essar announced the proposed construction of the EET Industrial Carbon Capture plant at the Stanlow Refinery in November 2022.  Participating in the Cluster Sequencing Track One Expansion process, the company plans for the facility to be operational in 2028, eliminating an estimated 860,000 tons of carbon dioxide per year – the equivalent of taking 400,000 cars off the road, or more than 40% of all Stanlow emissions.

The plant is a key part of Essar’s overall decarbonisation strategy, and central to its aim to meet its objective of becoming the UK’s first low carbon refinery.  The company is investing $1.2 billion over the next five years to lower emissions through decarbonising its production processes, putting it at the forefront of the UK’s energy transition and securing the refinery’s vital role ongoing role in UK energy security and resilience.

Essar will achieve its decarbonisations targets through a combination of incremental transformational projects, including energy efficiency and EET Industrial Carbon Capture and, as a result of the significant investments it is making into hydrogen and biofuels, via Essar Energy Transition (EET).  Ultimately, the company expects to achieve a 75% reduction in emissions by 2030 and be net zero by 2040.

The selection of MHI follows the completion of the pre-FEED phase for EET Industrial Carbon Capture which was delivered by Kent plc earlier this year.  Currently being tendered, the FEED phase of the project will begin in Q4 2023.

Essar Oil UK Limited (“Essar” or “the Company”) today announces its plan to build a £360 million major new carbon capture plant at its Stanlow refinery in line with its ambition to become a leading low carbon refinery by 2030.

Essar is investing over £1 billion into a range of energy efficiency, fuel-switching, and carbon capture initiatives, designed to decarbonise its production processes significantly by 2030 and put Essar at the forefront of the UK’s shift to low carbon energy.

Essar’s energy transition strategy is based on five principles: running the core Stanlow refining processes as efficiently and safely as possible; decarbonising Stanlow’s operations; building a hydrogen future through the launch of Vertex Hydrogen (“Vertex”) and as a key part of the HyNet consortium; developing green fuels (including Sustainable Aviation Fuels); and establishing the UK’s largest biofuels storage facility through Stanlow Terminals Limited.

Essar will achieve its decarbonisation targets through a combination of incremental (energy efficiency and operating improvements) and transformational projects, including the £360 million carbon capture plant announced today, but also as a result of the significant investments Essar is making into hydrogen and biofuels.

Kent plc has been awarded a pre-FEED engineering contract to develop the facility that will take the CO2 emitted from one of Europe’s largest full-Residue Fluidised Catalytic Cracking units, located at the Stanlow refinery.  The gas will be permanently sequestered into depleted gas fields under the sea in Liverpool Bay, as part of the HyNet cluster infrastructure in the North West of England.

Once complete in 2027, the plant will eliminate an estimated 0.81 million tons of CO2 per year – the equivalent of taking 400,000 cars off the road, eliminating nearly 40% of all Stanlow emissions.  The project has been selected by BEIS as a Phase-2 winner in the CCUS cluster sequencing process earlier this summer, and as such, is currently progressing through the due diligence stage.