McDermott and BW Offshore, two of the leading players in the global energy market, announced their intent to engage in a joint test and development on the production of blue ammonia offshore. A partnership among the companies will merge energy infrastructure and offshore facilities knowledge and expertise to fashion a feasible, sustainable solution for low-carbon production at sea. The partnership will tap into the capabilities of both companies in support of the global energy transition.
Demand for Low-Carbon Solutions
A low-carbon future is the way of the world now. And at the heart of this vision lie low-carbon solutions. Blue ammonia, produced from natural gas while capturing and storing carbon dioxide emissions from the process, presents the first real alternative to those industries which want to lower their carbon footprint.
Both McDermott and BW Offshore are targeting the presentation of a scalable solution in line with a trend towards cleaner energy around the world, once the technical and commercial viability of producing blue ammonia is off-shore starts to materialize. The partnership supports the growing trend of low-carbon energy sources and aims to accelerate the adoption of ammonia as a viable fuel for industries that will aim to decarbonize.
Role of FPSOs in offshore ammonia production
This project is dominated mainly by Floating Production Storage and Offloading facilities. Basically, these FPSOs are ship-like vessels that have been engineered in such a way to extract, process, and store hydrocarbons or other products directly offshore. With its deep experience in FPSO technology, BW Offshore can bring this capability to the table when producing it with the production process, yet focus more on a more sustainable production process for blue ammonia.
There are several advantages of FPSOs in ammonia production. First, they make ammonia production directly off a ship, reducing by great degrees all the much-needed environmental costs which are supposedly tied to onshore productions plants. Production location flexibility is another advantage offered by FPSOs, as production can be carried out in areas that may not be viable for land-based facilities. They save on costs in terms of the time taken to produce and saving time to bring ammonia to the market.
This project will utilize FPSO technology from BW Offshore to reduce both costs and an environmental footprint in ammonia production. It is expected that the partnership will be environmentally compliant with more stringent standards on environmental regulations developed worldwide.
What role does McDermott play in the partnership?
McDermott is a global leader in energy infrastructure and would bring its EPCI capabilities to this project. The company’s track record of complex energy-related projects and its global network of fabrication facilities may be extremely useful for this endeavor. McDermott will design and fabricate the offshore module with regard to an efficient, sustainable blue ammonia production process.
Modular construction techniques adopted by the company to construct the offshore production facilities for ammonia will make the process streamlined and cost-effective. Modular construction is also easier to install and scalable in the future, especially with growing global demand meant to meet increasingly required ammonia as a low-carbon source of energy.
Contributes to Energy Transition
Both view this partnership as an important step toward supporting the energy transition. Blue ammonia production not only lowers the carbon footprint of producing ammonia but also is a means through which industrialized sectors can reduce their dependency on fossil sources. This has boosted its significance in the overall energy mix, given that ammonia has now been possibly earmarked as a form of fuel for industries engaged in shipping and other nearly impossible-to-decarbonize sectors.
The McDermott-BW Offshore partnership is part of a larger trend in the energy sector to develop new technologies and solutions that will accelerate the shift to low-carbon energy sources. By combining the expertise of McDermott in offshore production with BW Offshore’s experience in energy infrastructure, this partnership could be placed at the forefront of an emerging market.
Commercial and technical opportunities
This partnership will not only define the technical feasibility of offshore production of blue ammonia but also the commercial possibilities related to it. Blue ammonia is a rapidly emerging field when demand for low-carbon energy solutions is increasing. The market for this green energy solution, which is blue ammonia, is expected to increase drastically in the future. This is exactly what McDermott and BW Offshore are targeting: tapping into this growing demand while providing a solution to support global transitions to cleaner energy.
On the other hand, through McDermott’s connections with leading technology providers, the project will avail itself of the latest innovations in ammonia production and carbon capture technology. In this manner, blue ammonia produced through this initiative would meet the highest standard of sustainability and efficiency.
Powering the Future for Low-Carbon Ammonia
And in such a backdrop, blue ammonia emerges as a new avenue for carbon abatement. With McDermott and BW Offshore, this partnership will be at the forefront of changing the direction of offshore ammonia production. The firms combine their expertise in FPSO technology and energy infrastructure to develop a scalable, sustainable solution that contributes to global efforts to combat climate change.
Since the project is only in its infancy, much room remains for growth in demand for low-carbon energy as more production mandates emerge across the globe. McDermott and BW Offshore, by focusing on the development of blue ammonia, put themselves at the forefront of the energy transition, helping to drive the future of low-carbon energy solutions.
Conclusion
Blue ammonia production using partnerships between McDermott and BW Offshore takes the development much further from where it is now toward meeting increased demand in a global low-carbon energy solutions market. There’s plenty yet to be achieved toward developing a commercially viable solution for ammonia production in terms of meeting future demand requirements with the FPSO technology and experience on energy infrastructure that McDermott possesses.
Source: McDermott