Fortescue designs and builds its own electrolyser ahead of green hydrogen push

Fortescue Future Industries has made another major step forward in its push into the green hydrogen industry, announcing that it has designed and built its own electrolyser capable of producing renewable hydrogen.

FFI chairman Andrew Forrest has spoken openly about his desire to tap into the engineering expertise that exists within the Fortescue business, having previously converted a large mining haul truck to run on hydrogen, and setting a 12-month goal to produce a zero emissions ship.

Now it has sought to apply that expertise to develop its own electrolyser, which has been built using a pressurised alkaline system and will be used to supply and test other hydrogen technologies being developed by Fortescue.

Forrest is leading a push to pivot his Fortescue Metals Group, one of the world’s largest iron ore producers, into the green energy space, particularly renewable hydrogen, and has made dozens of announcements about proposed projects in Australia and around the globe.

Last week, the CSIRO released the latest iteration of its annual GenCost assessment, which included new predictions of the substantial electrolyser cost reductions expected to be achieved over the next decade, as the global installed capacity of electrolyser technologies surges.

FFI CEO Julie Shuttleworth said the company’s own electrolyser was a critical step forward for Fortescue, which has set itself a target of producing at least 15 million tonnes of green hydrogen annually by 2030.

“This is another outstanding achievement from our FFI in-house scientists and engineers – who are continuing to break new ground,” Shuttleworth said.

“The FFI team has designed and operated our own electrolyser system, which will be key to developing FFI’s green hydrogen production into the future.”

In a statement on Monday, FFI said that the process had yielded a number of new innovations in electrolyser design, which would form part of the company’s “electrolyser patent family”.

Renewable hydrogen is being touted as a potential replacement for the fossil fuels used to process iron ore into steel products, and Forrest is seeking to position Fortescue as a leading player in this emerging market.

Improving and scaling-up electrolyser technologies will be vital to this vision, as they allow for hydrogen to be extracted from water using electricity, which can be supplied from renewable energy projects.

FFI has previously announced that it had signed a ‘letter of intent’ with US-based electrolyser manufacturer Plug Power to establish a 50-50 venture for the creation of a gigawatt-scale electrolyser factory in Queensland.

FFI’s in-house electrolyser’s development was undertaken independent of the Plug Power deal, at a Fortescue facility in Western Australia.

“This electrolyser was internally designed, built and commissioned by a small, dedicated team of experts – an impressive achievement that is representative of the hard work that is happening across the whole of FFI,” Forrest said.

“The team spent thousands of hours on this project, facing setbacks along the way, but they pushed forward and managed to produce hydrogen before their stretch target date – something they should be incredibly proud of.”

Fortescue said it was in the process of installing solar panels at its Dawson Road facility, where the electrolyser has been built, with the plan to power the electrolyser with solar electricity starting next year.

It’s the latest in a flurry of end-of-year announcements from FFI, which has included plans to convert to former industrial sites to become renewable hydrogen facilities – including repurposing a New Zealand oil refinery to produce hydrogen and retrofitting a Brisbane ammonia factory to use hydrogen instead of fossil gas as a feedstock.

Earlier in the month, Fortescue also announced that it would partner with AGL to create the “Hunter Energy Hub”, which could include investments in wind, pumped hydro, solar thermal storage, and grid-scale batteries, as part of AGL’s vision for replacing the Liddell power station with clean energy infrastructure.