Kraft Heinz has signed an agreement with UK energy infrastructure development firm, Carlton Power, to assess the development of a renewable green hydrogen plant in Wigan, UK. The proposed sustainable facility will be located at its Kitt Green manufacturing plant, which is one of its largest in Europe, producing a quarter of a million tons […]
Kraft Heinz has signed an agreement with UK energy infrastructure development firm, Carlton Power, to assess the development of a renewable green hydrogen plant in Wigan, UK.
The proposed sustainable facility will be located at its Kitt Green manufacturing plant, which is one of its largest in Europe, producing a quarter of a million tons of food annually and hosting about 850 employees.
According to Kraft Heinz, the 20MW Kitt Green hydrogen plant will meet more than 50% of the plant’s annual natural gas demand and reduce its carbon emissions by 16,000 tonnes per year.
The hydrogen will be produced by an electrolyser using electricity generated from sources of renewable energy, primarily wind and solar power.
Over the next year and a half, the two firms will seek to obtain planning permission for the £40 million renewable hydrogen scheme, which it aims to have in operation by 2026.
Will hydrogen fuel our future?
It also aims to secure financial support from the UK Government’s second Hydrogen Allocation Round (HAR2) of the Hydrogen Production Business Model (HPBM), which the government launched to support the industry switch to hydrogen within the country.
“Our agreement with Carlton Power is an important step forward in our efforts to reduce carbon emissions and achieve our global goal of net zero emissions by 2050, with a 50% reduction in emissions by 2030,” said Northern European president of Kraft Heinz, Jojo Lins De Noronha.
“We’re excited to partner together to develop our first, renewable hydrogen energy project globally and hope to see more projects like these in the future,” Noronha added.
“It is critical that projects like this are brought forward to support British companies, especially in manufacturing, in reducing their carbon emissions and reaching Net Zero,” said Eric Adams, hydrogen projects director at Carlton Power.
The green hydrogen scheme is Carlton Power’s third to be developed in North West England, and the second in Greater Manchester.
A big issue in deploying the sustainable fuel is the expense of deploying it – something industrial software firm AVEVA hopes to tackle with its digital twin solution.
