In an announcement made yesterday, the USA-based leading technology developer and provider, Honeywell UOP, expressed its gratification on being selected by South Korea’s leading refiner SK Innovation Co. Ltd., for providing its carbon capture technology for retrofitting of SK Innovation’s hydrogen facility in Ulsan, South Korea. The move mimics South Korea’s sustainability roadmap to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.

SK Innovation will be examining the carbon capture and sequestration feasibility for its hydrogen production unit which produces 400,000 tons of carbon dioxide annually. The captured carbon dioxide is planned to be reinjected in the diminishing natural gas reservoirs.

Hydrogen, being an energy-dense gas, exhibits the potential to bring the much-needed transition to sustainability in the petrochemical industry, the highest source of pollutants, owing to its zero-carbon emission capability on combustion. Hydrogen has wide usage in powering electric vehicles, fertilizer production, refinery processes and reduction of metallic ores.

As per ChemAnalyst, the shifting focus of various economies toward sustainable production methods and the tightening laws on climate changes are pushing the demand for hydrogen in many industrial sectors. The global market for hydrogen is expected to grow at a CAGR of over 6% with hydrogen mobility and petrochemical sectors being the major end-user industries. The introduction of carbon-capturing technology with hydrogen production is an important step as it will ensure abidance to sustainability from end to end. The blue hydrogen production is expected to satiate the growing hydrogen demand in the Asia Pacific region and will also aid in lowering down the hydrogen prices in the international markets.