Hydrogen Export

OVERVIEW

Developed nations are encouraging the establishment of a large seaborne hydrogen market. The WA Government has targeted the same share of global hydrogen exports as its LNG exports today, which is around 12%. The Bristol Springs Project is strategically located for exporting green hydrogen, with four ports within a 100km radius, of which Kwinana and Bunbury are the closest.

The shipping of liquid hydrogen from Australia is in its infancy (trial shipments began in January 2022) and physical hurdles are formidable. Liquifying hydrogen is not currently commercially viable and capital and operating grants and subsidies would be required. For storage and transport of liquified product, ammonia is preferred over hydrogen.

There is already a seaborne ammonia market. The advantage of ammonia is that it has a far higher liquefaction temperature of -33OC (compared to -253OC for H2) and therefore lends itself to seaborne exports using already existing shipping technology.

There needs to be significant Project scale prior to export being considered. Frontier believes this would likely need to be in excess of 1GW of energy as a minimum, and potentially a multiple of this size.

Given the need for significant capital investment in liquefaction plants, terminals and hydrogen to ammonia conversion plants, as well as regulatory change to enable gas transmission in the DBNGP and gas networks to supply export ports, Frontier views this as a long term opportunity.

However, this may be accelerated if Government mandates for green hydrogen export are accelerated, and Frontier continues to engage with potential exporters, who are showing interest in pursuing this opportunity.