Algerian national oil company, Sonatrach, has signed Memorandum of Understandings with two German companies to cooperate on green hydrogen and downstream projects.
Sonatrach and H&R Group have agreed to cooperate on a feasibility study exploring the use of by-lubricants of the Arzew refinery in Algeria to develop mineral oil specialties including white oils, petroleum jellies, paraffin waxes and lubricants.
Arzew Refinery has a distillation capacity of 3 million tons of oil per annum and 60,000 barrels of oil per day. The deal is part of efforts by Sonatrach to deliver more value from its operations at Arzew, according to a statement.
In addition, Sonatrach signed an agreement with Leipzig-based natural gas company, VNG AG, to conduct green hydrogen and green ammonia demonstrations with the aim to export to Germany to meet growing energy demand.
Sonatrach and VNG AG will work together on projects aimed at maximizing Algeria’s entire green hydrogen value chain from production, transportation, storage and marketing. The two parties will co-assess the commercial viability of projects to be developed.
The signing of the MoU follows Algeria developing a national green hydrogen roadmap which includes the launch of various pilot projects in the medium term, the optimization of the country’s solar energy market to drive the green hydrogen market expansion as well the development of an international pipeline linking Algeria and Europe to support green hydrogen trading between the north African country and the European market.
