The duo will work on Tulum’s first pilot plant that will deploy its natural gas-to-hydrogen and solid carbon technology derived from electric-arc plasma reactor systems.

The new contract will see SEC undertake design, engineering, and construction management work on the plant across 2026 and 2027.

Details of the plant’s capacity and operational timeline remain unclear.

In July 2025, Tulum raised $27m (€23.6m) in a seed funding round for the realisation of the project, which it claims will require eight times less land than conventional electrolysis facilities.

A spin out of steel, engineering, and energy major Technint Group, Tulum’s technology is based on large-scale electric arc furnaces used in steel production, and was developed in tandem with metals processing firm Tenova.

Methane pyrolysis splits natural gas feedstocks in the absence of oxygen into hydrogen with carbon generated in a solid form such as graphene, graphite, carbon black and more.

Solid carbon products are an increasingly valuable product, bolstering turquoise hydrogen’s viability as an alternative to green and blue hydrogen, which both continue to face high costs.

November 2025 saw ExxonMobil and BASF partnered up on a demo turquoise hydrogen plant in Texas, and UK gas storage firm EnergyPathways started engineering design for a planned facility in England.

Methane pyrolysis, however, remains largely pre-commercial, facing several hurdles in competing with electrolysis-based hydrogen

Managing the carbon products it generates and its dependency on natural gas creates additional market risks.