Letter on hydrogen: Equinor’s low-carbon retreat

Norwegian energy company has dropped a major hydrogen project and paused its CCS expansion plans as demand fails to materialise

Equinor’s appetite for low-carbon projects has been dwindling for some time, but the Norwegian energy firm has raised eyebrows with recent decisions to axe its largest European blue hydrogen project and to pause all new investments in CCS. The H2M Eemshaven blue hydrogen project in the northeast of the Netherlands, which Equinor has been developing with German industrial gases form Linde, had not reached FID but had been expected to make a sizeable contribution to the EU’s 2030 clean hydrogen production target. The plan had been to start production in 2028 at a rate of 210,000t/yr. Demand for the hydrogen was expected to come from industrial sectors including steel, chemicals and power gener