Under the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), revealed today (November 8), the companies hope to accelerate the delivery of green hydrogen and its derivatives from Energy Estate’s portfolio of over 30GW of decarbonisation projects.

H2 View understands the new partners will advance the Hunter Hydrogen Network (H2N) in New South Wales, a 1.6GW project developed by Energy Estate and Eurus Energy which was announced in 2021.

Read more: Australia’s Hunter Hydrogen Network project progress

Read more: Hydrogen valley plans unveiled for New South Wales, Australia

It is hoped the Energy Estate and Abergeldie collaboration will enable the delivery of green hydrogen on a 24/7 basis for the production of ammonia, e-fuels, and other hydrogen derivative products, while encouraging new investment into the green hydrogen sector across Australian states.

Additionally, the companies have said integrating green hydrogen production and storage will help balance intermittent renewable energy supplies.

“We are delighted to deepen our collaboration with an Australian owned business with a storage technology critical to the advancement of the hydrogen economy. Our collaboration with Abergeldie will be a critical factor in delivery of our portfolio of green hydrogen projects,” Simone O’Sullivan, Director of Decarbonisation at Energy Estate commented.

According to Abergeldie, in 2019 it established Ardent Underground, a large-scale hydrogen storage facility, which Mick Boyle, founder and Executive Chairman of Abergeldie, said was replicable.

Boyle explained, “Abergeldie Complex Infrastructure is looking forward to collaborating with Energy Estate on green hydrogen projects. Abergeldie established Ardent Underground in 2019 to repurpose our world leading blind boring technology so as develop safe, cost-effective, large scale and replicable hydrogen storage.”

Commenting on the potential of the underground storage technology, David Bentley, General Manager of Ardent Underground, said, “We have developed a unique hydrogen storage technology and are fully supported by Abergeldie’s proven track record of delivering complex infrastructure.

“Locally, we are already seeing significant opportunities for the optimisation of large-scale renewable hydrogen production and storage projects. Ardent Underground is looking forward to being part of the Energy Estate and Abergeldie collaboration to accelerate the transition to green hydrogen.”