07-06-2022

Repsol / Aramco select Fischer Tropsch CANS and HyCOgen technology from Johnson Matthey

Johnson Matthey, a global leader in sustainable technologies, and bp, an international energy company, have announced that their co-developed, ground-breaking Fischer Tropsch CANS technology and Johnson Matthey’s innovative reverse water gas shift technology, HyCOgen, have been selected for use by Aramco and Repsol at a new synthetic fuels plant in Bilbao, Spain.

The plant will be one of the world's first to use renewable (green) hydrogen and CO2 as its only raw materials. It is due to be commissioned in 2024, with a starting capacity of more than 2,100 tonnes per year. It will produce a sustainable synthetic drop-in fuel that can be blended for existing road vehicle engines, planes and ships.

It is the second licence signed for the FT CANS technology, which was jointly developed with bp to deliver significant environmental and operational benefits. It converts synthesis gas (syngas), generated from sources such as industrial emissions, direct air capture, municipal solid waste or other renewable biomass, into long-chain hydrocarbons suitable for the production of diesel and jet fuels.

It is the first licence signed for Johnson Matthey’s recently launched HyCOgen technology, which uses a catalysed process to convert CO2 and green hydrogen into carbon monoxide (CO), which is then combined with additional hydrogen to form syngas. Coupling HyCOgen and FT CANS technologies provides an end-to-end, scalable process optimized for high conversion efficiency – enabling the production of premium quality synthetic crude oil.

The scalability of the combined HyCOgen and FT CANS solutions enables cost-effective deployment across a wide range of project sizes. Either technology can also be licensed independently.