MHI and Orica to jointly explore hydrogen and ammonia opportunities

November 27, 2023, by Aida Čučuk

Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) and Australia’s Orica have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to explore potential opportunities for collaboration on emission reduction initiatives, aligned with the companies’ shared decarbonization ambitions.

Courtesy of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI)

The collaboration covers various areas of mutual interest, including exploring technology deployment opportunities for renewable hydrogen and renewable ammonia production near Orica’s facilities in Newcastle and Gladstone, Australia, creating demand opportunities for renewable hydrogen and renewable ammonia in the power generation, maritime, industrial and agricultural industries and investigating activities to further reduce emissions from Orica’s existing operations, MHI said.

Commenting on the MoU, Hitoshi Kaguchi, Senior Executive Vice President at MHI, responsible for energy transition and the expansion of growth fields, said it is a great honor to be able to collaborate with Orica, adding that MHI is looking forward to contributing to Orica’s ‘Net Zero Ambition.’

Andrew Stewart, Orica’s Chief Development and Sustainability Officer, stated: “This collaboration signals another step towards building Orica’s climate resilience and opportunities to support further growth while supporting our customers to achieve their ESG goals. We look forward to working with MHI to explore potential emissions reduction opportunities for our organizations and our customers.”

To note, this year in Australia, MHI has also entered a clean energy partnership with the Port of Newcastle as part of the port’s 30 partnerships with domestic and multi-national organizations aimed at advancing the port’s plans of regenerating a 220-hectare parcel of industrial wasteland into a dedicated ‘Clean Energy Precinct.’

At the time, Kaguchi said: “The port has long been an important base for Japan as a resource shipping port, and through this project, we will work together with the port to contribute to the decarbonization of Australia and Japan.”