ExxonMobil and partners to study green hydrogen

ExxonMobil, Grieg Edge, North Ammonia, and GreenH have signed a memorandum of understanding to study potential production and distribution of green hydrogen and ammonia for lower-emission marine fuels at ExxonMobil’s Slagen terminal in Norway, said the company.

The study will explore the potential for the terminal, which is powered by hydroelectricity, to produce up to 20,000 metric tons of green hydrogen per year and distribute up to 100,000 metric tons of green ammonia per year. The hydrogen would be produced from hydro-powered electrolysis.

"Hydrogen has the potential to significantly reduce CO2 emissions in key sectors of the global economy that create valuable products that support modern life,” said Dan Ammann, president of ExxonMobil Low Carbon Solutions. “This study will explore the potential for ExxonMobil’s Slagen fuel terminal to help reduce emissions from Norway’s maritime sector and help achieve society’s net-zero ambitions."

ExxonMobil brings its experience and expertise in developing complex, global projects to advance meaningful greenhouse gas emissions reductions, such as the Slagen terminal opportunity. Grieg Edge, GreenH and North Ammonia will provide their expertise in sustainable maritime transport, hydrogen infrastructure, and green hydrogen and ammonia project development, to study the feasibility for a green hydrogen and ammonia redistribution facility.

"Slagen is an exceptionally suitable location as a central hub for hydrogen and ammonia to the maritime sector,” said Matt Duke, CEO of Grieg Maritime Group. “With the complementary expertise amongst the MOU partners, we have now taken an important next step in our efforts to achieve emissions reductions in the maritime sector."

The International Energy Agency projects hydrogen will meet 10% of global energy needs by 2050, and says it is critical to achieving societal net-zero global emissions. The Norwegian government has published a road map for hydrogen that includes establishing low-emissions hydrogen hubs along the coast of Norway. The Slagen terminal is located at the opening of the Oslofjord, where more than 10,000 ships pass through every year.

"There is high value in producing green hydrogen close to where consumption is,” said Morten S. Watle, CEO of GreenH. “At Slagen, bunkering of hydrogen could be offered straight from the production facility." Green ammonia is made by using renewable power to separate hydrogen from water (electrolysis). When used as a fuel, green ammonia has no carbon and generates zero CO2.

"This MOU underlines our strategy to make ammonia available where there is market demand,” said Vidar Lundberg, CEO of North Ammonia. “We will also assess the potential distribution of ammonia from production facilities south of Slagen."

ExxonMobil is working to commercialize lower-emission technologies and support society’s net-zero ambitions by leveraging the skills, knowledge and scale of the business. In addition to evaluating development of ammonia and hydrogen, the company is pursuing strategic investments in carbon capture and storage and biofuels to help bring those lower-emissions energy technologies to scale for hard-to-decarbonize sectors of the global economy.

ExxonMobil is planning to build one of North America’s largest low-carbon hydrogen production facilities at its Baytown, Texas petrochemical complex and is also studying potential for a similar facility at its Southampton Fawley complex in the United Kingdom.

ExxonMobil is exploring opportunities to use ammonia as a low-emission and high-efficiency energy carrier, particularly to ship and store hydrogen over long distances. Ammonia is typically produced from natural gas and is commonly used as an industrial and agricultural chemical, particularly in fertilizer, but has the potential for wide use in power generation, industrial heat and marine fuels.

As per MRC, Neptune Energy, ExxonMobil subsidiary XTO Netherlands, Ltd., Rosewood Exploration Ltd., and EBN Capital B.V. announced the signing of a Cooperation Agreement to progress the L10 large-scale offshore carbon capture and storage project in the Dutch North Sea. The agreement brings together the technical and commercial capabilities necessary to create a robust carbon storage offering for industrial customers in the Dutch sector. It intends to take the L10 carbon capture and storage development to the concept select stage in 2022 and to have the project FEED-ready by the end of the year, followed by the submission of a storage licence application.

As per MRC, ExxonMobil expects to add approximately 20,000 bpd of light, heavy and extra-heavy lubricant base stocks when upgrades at its Singapore integrated refining and petrochemical complex are complete in 2025.
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Entegris, Inc. and CMC Materials, Inc. announced a definitive merger agreement under which Entegris will acquire CMC Materials in a cash and stock transaction with an enterprise value of approximately USD6.5 billion, said the company.

Under the terms of the agreement, CMC Materials shareholders will receive USD133.00 in cash and 0.4506 shares of Entegris common stock for each share of CMC Materials common stock they own. The total per share consideration represents a 35% premium over CMC Materials’ closing price on December 14, 2021, and a 38% premium to the 10-day volume weighted average share price. Upon completion of the transaction, Entegris shareholders will own approximately 91% of the combined company and CMC Materials shareholders will own approximately 9%.

As per MRC, A new report by the EIA, titled Global Surplus Crude Oil Production Capacity, provides estimates of global surplus crude oil production capacity in both OPEC countries and non-OPEC countries. Preliminary estimates for these data show that, as of May 2022, surplus capacity in non-OPEC countries decreased by 80% compared with 2021. The data show that, in 2021, 1.4 MMbpd of surplus production capacity was available in non-OPEC countries, about 60% of which was in Russia.

CMC Materials is a leading supplier of advanced materials primarily for the semiconductor industry. The addition of CMC Materials’ leading CMP portfolio will broaden Entegris’ solutions set, creating a comprehensive electronic materials offering. The complementary nature of the companies’ technology platforms will enable Entegris to bring to market a broader array of innovative and high-value solutions, at a faster pace. These enhanced materials and process solutions for the most advanced manufacturing environments will help customers improve productivity, performance and total cost of ownership.
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A major new oil refinery under construction on Mexico's Gulf coast will ultimately cost between USD11 B and USD12 B, up from around USD8 B originally estimated by the government, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Lopez Obrador told reporters at his regular morning news conference that the flagship project owned and operated by state-run oil company Pemex will be ready to start producing gasoline in 2023. The leftist president argues that the Olmeca refinery, Mexico's first such new facility built in four decades, is needed to wean the country off of foreign supplies of motor fuels, mostly imported from U.S. refiners.

The refinery, with a crude oil processing capacity of 340,000 barrels per day, will be Pemex's largest once it comes online. Reuters reported in April that the refinery was running over budget and unlikely to come online this year as promised, according to documents and sources close to the project, despite being a presidential priority.

Lopez Obrador conceded that the project's price tag has exceeded its initial budget, but that it has been approved by Pemex's board of directors. "There has been an increase," he said, referring to the project's budget, which he said has grown by between 20%-30%. It was not immediately clear why the percentage increase given did not match the U.S. dollar figures provided.

As per MRC, The Association of American Railroads (AAR) reported U.S. rail traffic for the week ending June 18, 2022. For this week, total U.S. weekly rail traffic was 501,207 carloads and intermodal units, down 2.5 percent compared with the same week last year. Total carloads for the week ending June 18 were 232,921 carloads, up 0.4 percent compared with the same week in 2021, while U.S. weekly intermodal volume was 268,286 containers and trailers, down 4.9 percent compared to 2021.
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The Novoshakhtinsk oil refinery in the south of Russia resumed operations after a fire caused by a drone attack on June 22, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The refinery in the Rostov region said the first of two drones flying from the direction of Ukraine struck at 8.40 a.m. (0540 GMT) on Wednesday, hitting a crude distillation unit and triggering a blast and ball of fire. Both primary crude oil distillation units at the refinery were down after the attack, but at least one was back online as of Friday, the sources said.

“The refinery is back online after the fire. June refining will be little affected, while in July they will have maintenance. It is not clear how much it may affect the output”, one of the sources said. A representative for the refinery did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

The Novoshakhtinsk refinery has an annual capacity of up to 7.5 million tonnes, and processed 5.2 million tonnes of crude last year.

As per MRC, Russian has expanded the list of oil refineries eligible for so-called reverse excise tax after they agreed to invest around 300 billion roubles (USD4.5 billion) to upgrade capacity by 2026, the energy ministry said. Russia’s most significant oil industry tax overhaul took effect on January 1. It is phasing out exporting duty in the next five years and increasing its mineral extraction tax.
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A new report by the EIA, titled Global Surplus Crude Oil Production Capacity, provides estimates of global surplus crude oil production capacity in both OPEC countries and non-OPEC countries, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Preliminary estimates for these data show that, as of May 2022, surplus capacity in non-OPEC countries decreased by 80% compared with 2021. The data show that, in 2021, 1.4 MMbpd of surplus production capacity was available in non-OPEC countries, about 60% of which was in Russia. As of May 2022, we estimate that all surplus production capacity in Russia was eliminated due to the sanctions implemented after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. We determined that excess oil production capacity declined in other non-OPEC producing countries as well. We estimate that, as of May 2022, producers in non-OPEC countries had about 280,000 bpd of surplus production capacity.

We define surplus capacity as the maximum existing capacity that can be brought online within 30 days and sustained for at least 90 days. Our assessment of surplus crude oil production capacity does not include volumes of oil that are offline because of unplanned outages and disruptions, including sanctions, because these volumes cannot be brought to market voluntarily. For that reason, we exclude crude oil production that is offline in Iran, Libya, Venezuela, and now Russia, from surplus capacity estimates.

Since 2003, we have tracked OPEC surplus capacity in a separate publication: the Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO). Global Surplus Crude Oil Production Capacity includes information about surplus production capacity located in both OPEC and non-OPEC member countries, based on STEO data. Our estimates of global surplus crude oil production capacity now date back to 1970 and provide a longer history of this measure. We define OPEC in terms of its current membership.

In our June STEO, we estimate that OPEC surplus capacity declined to 3.0 MMbpd by May 2022 from 5.4 MMbpd in 2021. As a result of the declines of surplus production capacity located in both OPEC and non-OPEC countries, global surplus crude oil production capacity in May 2022 was less than half of its 2021 average.

As per MRC, the Association of American Railroads (AAR) reported U.S. rail traffic for the week ending June 18, 2022. For this week, total U.S. weekly rail traffic was 501,207 carloads and intermodal units, down 2.5 percent compared with the same week last year. Total carloads for the week ending June 18 were 232,921 carloads, up 0.4 percent compared with the same week in 2021, while U.S. weekly intermodal volume was 268,286 containers and trailers, down 4.9 percent compared to 2021.
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