Thyssenkrupp Materials Trading will offtake one million tonnes per annum (mtpa) of hot briquetted iron (HBI) while Interfer Edelstahl and Interfer Austria will recieve 250,000 tonnes. The remaining 1 mtpa will be supplied to Glencore and Meranti’s planned electric arc furnace in Thailand, at an unspecified ratio.

Located in Duqm’s Special Economic Zone, the HBI plant will start up using natural gas and small volumes of green hydrogen in a direct reduced iron (DRI) process, before ramping up green hydrogen volumes.

With Europe comprising the plant’s biggest offtake market, uptake of hydrogen at the plant will be linked to the EU’s emission trading scheme (ETS), Andrew Fang, Meranti’s Vice-President Projects and Sustainability, has previously told H2 View.

Even by using 100% natural gas, Meranti said the plant could produce HBI with 60% fewer emissions than iron made in blast furnaces using coking coal.

“The price of carbon dioxide under the ETS is expected to rise over time, and that will then allow for greater adoption of green hydrogen in our process,” Fang said.

Meranti recently inked a memorandum of understanding with one of the first green hydrogen projects to be awarded land in Duqm under Oman’s green hydrogen auctions.

The agreement with Anmah Energy – made up of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), Blue Power Partners, and Al Khadra – will see the pair explore offtake from the planned green hydrogen plant.

With offtake now locked in for the project, Meranti is already exploring a second 2.5 mtpa line in Oman.