We proudly present Thomas Nilsson, General Manager, FlagshipONE at Liquid Wind as a keynote of RE-Scandinavia 2021 – online PPA-event June 17th! Read our interview with him here!
What is Liquid Wind?
Liquid Wind is a Power-to-Fuel Development Company, committed to reducing carbon emissions. The company develops, finances, builds and manages replicable facilities for the production of eMethanol, to accelerate the transition to carbon neutral shipping and transportation. Each facility will convert hydrogen, from renewable wind power, and captured carbon dioxide into liquid fuel.
A pre-study was conducted in 2016-17 with various large companies in the Västra Götaland-region in Sweden. The concept offered huge potential to reduce carbon emissions and Claes Fredriksson took it further and founded Liquid Wind. The company now has a strong consortium of technical partners and a robust commercial structure. As well as strong ambitions to establish 500 facilities by 2050 which will prevent the emission of 50M tonnes of CO2 every year, the equivilent of Sweden’s annual emissions.
An important part of the success so far is that we have built up a technical consortium with well-established technology suppliers; Siemens Energy, Haldor Topsøe, Carbon Clean, Alfa Laval and Worley. Together, we have the technical competence and the financial muscles to establish the first commercial-scale eMethanol facility and many more after that.
We have now secured the site for the first facility, in collaboration with Övik Energi. The consortium is now focused on Basic Engineering, designing and planning the technology integration for the facility. The plan is to establish a ‘bankable investment object’ which will be sold to a large, long-term investor, negotiations are progressing well. We are also on track to secure an off-taker for the fuel from the first facility.
The facility will use 550 GWh of renewable electricity per year to run the electrolysers. Liquid Wind will buy renewable electricity from new wind parks. A long PPA at a low price will be needed to ensure a cost-competitive price for the fuel. Liquid Wind is seeking PPA partners in Northern Sweden (SE1 and SE2) Construction of the first facility is planned from 2022, with the facility operational and supplying carbon neutral fuel from 2024.
What challenges do you see in signing PPA?
Electricity supply from renewable production at the right price is incredibly important to enabling carbon neutral shipping and transportation. Electricity is the largest OPEX and a considerable part of the final product cost. We intend to contract directly with a new wind power plant, to ensure additionality. It will be important that the entire value chain is interconnected, which will present an interesting new challenge to structuring a PPA.
It is an ongoing process, we have now shared our requirements with the market and will be reviewing suitable planned wind power projects. Each facility will use 550 GWh, producing green hydrogen is an electricity-intense process. The challenge for the success of Power-to-X, is that all costs must reduce, this is happening and will continue over the next ten to fifteen years. In the slightly longer perspective, large-scale solar energy is perhaps even more attractive than Nordic wind power.
What are your hopes for RE-Scandinavia on 17 June?
RE-Scandinavia is a great opportunity for us, we are excited to share our plans and show how the value of renewable electricity can extend to new industries via eFuel.
Sweden is in a fantastic position to lead the development of Power-to-Fuel. There is strong growth and investment in renewable wind power and we have some of the lowest prices in Europe. We also have access to biogenic CO2 from our strong pulp and paper industry and Sweden is attractive and trusted for project financing. Liquid Wind has a strong opportunity to commercialise this potential and I’m looking forward to discuss this further with leaders in the wind industry.
