COP28 president Ahmad Al Jaber promotes blue ammonia as a decarbonisation solution. We spoke to various experts who disagree.
“When I first started hearing about blue hydrogen, let alone blue ammonia, it seemed like a scam, quite frankly,” Robert Howarth, Professor of Ecology and Environmental Biology at Cornell University, states. “In some ways, it is.”
However the president of COP28 in the United Arab Emirates, Sultan Al Jaber, praises blue ammonia as a ‘low-carbon product’.
As well as leading the world’s key conference on fighting climate change, Al Jaber is the UAE’s Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology and CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC).
ADNOC has been developing its capacity for blue ammonia exports as part of an effort to present itself as a ‘greener’ company.
What is blue ammonia?
Ammonia is a colourless gas made up of hydrogen and nitrogen that acts as a carrier fuel for hydrogen. It allows for safer and more efficient storage of hydrogen, an energy carrier which many industry experts lauded as a decarbonisation solution. Blue ammonia is achieved by capturing carbon dioxide emissions from its production.
The first cargo of blue ammonia left the UAE in 2021 headed for Japan. Fertiglobe, a joint venture between ADNOC and Dutch chemical company OCI, produced the blue ammonia in the Ruwais Industrial Complex in Abu Dhabi. Fertiglobe sold further shipments to customers in Germany and South Korea. Plans are underway to build a commercial-scale blue ammonia factory in Ruwais.
Read more: euronews.com
Photo: euronews.com
Leave a Reply