Advanced BioFuels USA

by Xu Yihe (Upstream Energy Explored)  Facility will capture CO2 emissions from manufacturing process and store them in depleted North Sea field — Chinese manufacturing group Shanghai Yanda Engineering has cut the first steel for modules as part of biofuels facilities for the Shell Energy and Chemicals Park in Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

Billed as one of the largest biofuels facilities in Europe, the REDIIGreen project will produce bio gasoil and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) from waste streams like vegetable oils, animal fats, used cooking oil and other industrial and agricultural residual products.

The facility will be able to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 2.8 million tonnes per annum, which is equivalent to the CO₂ emissions of 1 million petrol cars a year, thus contributing to Shell’s ambition to become carbon neutral by 2050.

Yanda’s work scope includes modules engineering, bulk material procurement, modules fabrication, mechanical completion and modules pre-commissioning. The modules will be built at Yanda’s facilities in Haimen city in Jiangsu province in China.

Last year, Shell selected Australian engineering house Worley to provide design and procurement services for the REDIIGreen project. The project is scheduled for completion and delivery in April 2024. The facility aims to produce 820,000 tonnes of low-carbon fuel annually.

Shell in September 2021 took the final investment decision on the project . The plant is expected to use technology to capture carbon emissions from the manufacturing process and store them in a a depleted gas field beneath the North Sea through the Porthos project.

Shell aims to reduce the production of traditional fuels by 55% by 2030 and provide more low-carbon fuels such as biofuels for road transport and aviation, and hydrogen.

The UK supermajor earlier said that low-carbon fuels will help to meet growing demand from the transport sector, including hard-to-decarbonise sectors such as heavy road transport and aviation.

Shell last September announced that it plans to produce 2 million tpa of SAF by 2025, with the fuel making up 10% of its global aviation sales by 2030.

The facility complements Shell’s plans to build a 200-megawatt hydrogen electrolyser in the Port of Rotterdam, and the planned Porthos carbon capture and storage project, both of which could help to decarbonise operations at the biofuels plant.

Shell also is working with partners to create a green hydrogen hub in the Port of Rotterdam.

In July 2020, Shell and Eneco were awarded a tender for the 759-MW Hollandse Kust Noord offshore wind project in the North Sea. This renewable power can be used to produce green hydrogen at the planned 200-MW electrolyser, which is intended to start operations by 2023 to produce about 50,000 to 60,000 kilogrammes of hydrogen a day. READ MORE