South Korea’s SK Group has announced plans to build a 140,000 square meter hydrogen fuel base in Ulsan. A liquid hydrogen production plant will be built, and a hydrogen-fueled power plant will also be constructed.
With the participation of Lotte Chemical, the project aims to promote the accumulation of hydrogen-related industries in the city. SK Gas will be the main proponent of the project. The company plans to invest 2.2 trillion won (about 216 billion yen) over the next five years to build infrastructure for the generation, storage, and transportation of hydrogen energy in anticipation of its widespread use, and has also announced plans to build 100 hydrogen filling stations in South Korea by 2030.
The complex will also have facilities to receive LNG vessels and to extract and liquefy hydrogen from LNG. It will use a technology that generates hydrogen by reacting natural gas with steam at high temperature and pressure. The CO2 emitted in the process will be recovered and stored to produce hydrogen. The company will establish a joint venture with Lotte Chemical for hydrogen-related technology within this year.
Source: The Nikkei
PSR Analysis: You can find hydrogen-related news almost every month in Korea, but SK’s aggressive investment stands out in particular. SK has invested 18 trillion won (1.7 trillion yen) for the development of hydrogen infrastructure over the next five years, and 1.6 trillion won in Plug Power, a US fuel cell manufacturer. The city of Ulsan is home to Hyundai’s flagship plant, and it is almost certain that this will become the cluster for the hydrogen business in Korea.
If you look for global FCV success stories, California and South Korea are probably the two most popular. Both have a large number of FCVs on the road. Right now, the real choices for FCVs are Toyota, Honda, and Hyundai. Chinese manufacturers may catch up in the future.
Europe and the United States are in a situation where they are almost completely devoted to EVs. The FCVs being explored by Japan and South Korea have yet to reach the stage of widespread use, but from a long-term perspective, the day may come when these investment efforts will be rewarded. PSR
Akihiro Komuro is Research Analyst, Far East and Southeast Asia, for Power Systems Research
