氣候變化：中國石化建設全球最大太陽能製氫廠，力爭比較國家目標提前十年實現碳中和

Recently Yahoo News on-line reported the following:

Climate Change: China’s Sinopec builds world’s biggest solar hydrogen plants in bid to achieve carbon neutrality a decade before national target

Eric Ng

South China Morning Post

Mon., August 23, 2021, 2:20 a.m.

China Petrochemical Corporation, or Sinopec Group, which is vying to lead the development of China’s nascent hydrogen industry, is building what it believes to be two of the world’s largest green hydrogen projects in the country’s north.

Sinopec has invested in the plants in Ordos, in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region, and in Tahe, in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, while its Hong Kong-listed unit, Sinopec Engineering, is in charge of design and construction. Both facilities will be powered by solar energy.

The company is banking on Beijing’s decarbonisation policies to boost the economic viability of and demand for the zero-carbon fuel and the equipment and facilities needed to produce it, according to the chairwoman of its engineering and technology unit, Sinopec Engineering (Group).

“It is normal for any new technology to require big cost reductions to achieve mass adoption,” Sun Lili told analysts and reporters on Monday. “We will do much more research and development, and welcome cooperation with partners to achieve these objectives.”

Sinopec, China’s largest oil refiner and petrochemical producer, aims to also become the country’s No. 1 hydrogen company by 2025 and achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050, a decade ahead of the national target. Net zero, or carbon neutrality, is achieved when emissions are offset by deploying facilities to capture and store the same amount from the atmosphere. Sinopec Engineering is developing carbon capture technology to meet the group’s goal to have a demonstration plant operating by 2025.

The plant in Ordos is expected to be completed by next year, Sinopec said in May. It will supply hydrogen to a coal-to-chemicals plant there run by Zhongtian Hechuang Energy, Sinopec’s joint venture with power generator Shenergy and miners China Coal Energy and Nei Mongol Man Shi Coal Group.

The second plant will supply Sinopec’s oil refinery in Tahe. Both plants have an annual output capacity of 10,000 tons.

Although the expected carbon dioxide reduction by introducing hydrogen into the Zhongtian and Tahe projects will not be big relative to their total emissions, it will represent a change as burning hydrogen emits no carbon dioxide, Sun said.

While the investment per ton of annual production capacity to produce the so-called green hydrogen from electrolysis of water using renewable energy is comparable to conventional carbon-intensive methods using naphtha and natural gas as feedstock, the unit operating cost of green hydrogen, while falling continuously, is two to three times that of traditional ways.

The higher cost of low-carbon green hydrogen should be understood in the context that the cost of carbon emissions has not yet been reflected in prevailing production methods, Sun said. “Once the environmental cost of carbon emissions is fully accounted for in the cost equation, we will have a different understanding of the relative costs,” she added.

Her comments came a month after China’s first national carbon quotas exchange started operations in July, placing a price on emissions that cause global warming and climate change, beginning with power generation. Analysts expect carbon permit prices to rise, as decarbonisation policies become more stringent and as more sectors, including chemicals, are subjected to emissions caps in the coming years and decades.

Meanwhile, Sinopec Engineering, which builds refineries and petrochemical plants, on Monday posted a 6.9 per cent year-on-year increase in net profit to 1.34 billion yuan (US$206.4 million) for the year’s first half, as revenue grew 12.8 per cent to 26.85 billion yuan.

The company expected a substantial rise in new contracts from the domestic market in the second half, but prospects in overseas markets were clouded by delays in projects in the Middle East and South Asia amid the coronavirus pandemic, said Jiang Dejun, its president.

Sinopec Engineering signed new contracts worth 36.6 billion yuan in the first half of 2021, compared to 63 billion yuan’s worth in the whole of last year. It has signed overseas contracts worth US$1.05 billion in the first half, and is targeting a full-year total of US$1.5 billion.

Translation

中國石化集團公司，或稱中石化，正在爭先地引領中國的新興氫能產業發展，在中國北部建設相信是世界上最大的兩個綠色氫能項目。

中石化在內蒙古自治區的鄂爾多斯(Ordos)和新疆維吾爾自治區的塔河投資了工廠，而其在香港上市的子公司中石化工程則負責設計和建設。這兩個設施都將由太陽能供電。

該公司工程技術部門中石化工程（集團）的主席表示，該公司依靠北京的脫碳政策來提高零碳燃料的經濟方面的可行性和需求，以及生產它所需的設備和設施。

孫麗麗 (Sun Lili) 週一告訴分析師和記者說: “任何新技術都需要被大規模採用才能實現大幅降低成本，這很正常”; “我們將做更多的研發工作，並歡迎與夥伴合作以實現這些目標” 。

作為中國最大的煉油和石化生產商，中石化的目標是到 2025 年成為中國第一大氫能公司，到 2050 年實現淨零碳排放，比國家目標提前十年。當碳排放量相比通過部署設施從大氣中回收和儲存的量相同時, 互相抵消，就實現了淨零或碳中和。中石化工程正在開發碳捕集技術，以實現該集團到 2025 年擁有一座示範工廠的目標。

中石化在 5 月份表示，鄂爾多斯 的工廠預計將於明年完工。它將為中天合創能源 (Zhongtian Hechuang Energy) 運營的煤化工工廠供應氫氣，該工廠是中石化與申能 (Shenergy), 及内蒙古满世煤炭集团股份有限公司 開礦者的合資企業。

第二個工廠將供應中石化在塔河(Tahe) 的煉油廠。兩家工廠的年產量均為10,000噸。

孫麗麗說，雖然中天和塔河項目引入氫氣所帶來的二氧化碳減排量相, 對於它們的總排放量來說不會很大，但由於燃燒氫氣不會排放二氧化碳，這將代表一個變化。

雖然使用可再生能源電解水生產所謂的綠色氫的每噸年產能投資, 與以石腦油和天然氣為原料的傳統碳密集型方法相約，但綠色氫的單位運營成本，雖然已在持續下降, 但仍是傳統方式的兩到三倍,。

孫麗麗說，低碳綠色氫的更高成本, 應該在碳排放成本尚未反映在主流生產方法中的背景下去理解。她補充道: “一旦碳排放的環境成本, 在成本方程中得到充分考慮時，我們對於 “相對成本” 的理解就會不同” 。

她的評論是在中國首個國家碳配額交易所於 7 月開始運營一個月後發表的，該交易所為導致全球變暖和氣候變化的排放定價，從發電開始。分析師預計，隨著脫碳政策變得更加嚴格，以及包括化學品在內的更多行業在未來幾年和幾十年受到排放上限的約束，碳排放許可証的價格將上漲。

與此同時，建造煉油廠和石化廠的中石化工程建设有限公司週一公佈上半年淨利潤同比增長 6.9% 至人民幣 13.4 億元（2.064 億美元），收入增長 12.8% 至268.5億元。

該公司總裁蔣德軍示，該公司預計下半年國內市場的新合同將大幅增加，但由於中東和南亞的項目在冠狀病毒大流行期間的延誤，海外市場的前景蒙上了陰影。

中石化工程2021年上半年新簽合同366億元，去年全年為630億元。上半年已簽訂海外合同10.5億美元，全年目標15億美元。

So, China Petrochemical Corporation, or Sinopec Group is building what it believes to be two of the world’s largest green hydrogen projects in China’s north. China is making a start in dealing with carbon emission using hydrogen.