Air Liquide China has broken ground on a $20m hydrogen filling centre in the Binhai New Area, Tianjin, to bring eight tonnes per day of filling capacity to the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (Jingjinji) region.
Set to be operational by the end of 2024, the hydrogen filling center is designed to compress gaseous hydrogen received through pipelines, enabling its transportation via tube trailer trucks to hydrogen refuelling stations (HRS) or industrial clients.
The announcement is part of a deal with the Tianjin Port Free Trade Zone in 2023.
Rui Coelho, CEO of Air Liquide China, said that the company is pleased to partner with the Tianjin Government to lead the hydrogen upstream deployment in the Tianjin Port Free Trade Zone.
He continued, “We will leverage our technological knowhow and operations experience and actively cooperate with local authorities, energy players, and fleet operators to contribute to decarbonising mobility and creating a more sustainable future.”
Air Liquide China already operates two hydrogen filling centres in the Jingjinji region, with a total capacity of 4.2 tonnes per day to support glassmaking, optical fibre, metallurgy, and electronics customers.
Hydrogen is an important part of China’s national energy and industrial strategy. In its “Medium and Long-term Plan for the Development of the Hydrogen Energy Industry (2021-2035),” the country outlined aims to deploy 50,000 hydrogen fuel cell vehicles by 2025.
As one of the five fuel cell vehicle demonstration city clusters, Tianjin plans to build at least 10 hydrogen refuelling stations and deploy 2,000 fuel cell vehicles by 2025.
In line with the group’s strategic plan entitled ADVANCE, Air Liquide has committed to reducing the carbon emissions of its own assets and providing its customers with solutions that enable them to reduce their carbon footprint.