2023-08-10 15:57:51
The British government must quickly make a billion-dollar decision. Will she follow conservative Britons and continue with plans for more oil and gas extraction in the North Sea, or will she opt for a future with sustainable energy?
Green energy billionaire Andrew Forrest has put the British government on the block. The Australian tycoon is demanding that London reverse plans for the extraction of oil and gas from the North Sea. If not, he threatens to withdraw his investments of hundreds of millions in, among other things, a British battery factory and hydrogen networks.
Showdown
I’m not sure, but I think this is the first time the new energy world has launched such a powerful, multibillion-backed assault on the old, fossil guard. It will be an interesting showdown, in which British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will be faced with the choice of whether he wants to belong to the past or to the future.
Sunak thinks that many voters on his Conservative Party are not in favor of a rapid energy transition. To make it clear that he does not want to blindly promote sustainable energy, his government has issued new licenses for oil and gas extraction in the North Sea. To the CO2To offset its emissions, London allocates many billions for the storage of that greenhouse gas.
That’s what Andrew Forrest has failed to do. And he is not unimportant to Sunak. He has invested hundreds of millions in a British battery factory and is working worldwide to develop a hydrogen network that can replace a lot of oil and gas.
Forrest also invests hundreds of millions in Norway and Germany. In the Netherlands, his company FFI took over Hyet two years ago, which makes solar foils with which solar energy can be produced very cheaply. Forrest is building a large HyET plant in Australia to produce hydrogen using power from the desert and then export it to Europe, among others. With his FFI, he seems well on his way to becoming the world’s largest hydrogen producer.
Abyss
Forrest has now made it clear to Sunak that he will withdraw all his investments in the UK if London persists in its plans for the North Sea. “If I see this country plunge into the abyss by supporting fossil fuels, I will disappear from here,” Forrest told Bloomberg TV.
Also the idea of CO2 to store underground, the so-called carbon capture and storage (CCS), finds no mercy in his eyes. London has already earmarked 23 billion euros for this technique, which has not yet been successfully applied on a large scale anywhere. According to Forrest, CCS is a fabrication of the fossil industry that hopes to be able to sell oil and gas for a long time to come. CCS is an industry that is “just waiting for the next crazy person to come along” to put money into it.
According to Forrest, leaders in politics and business must take into account that they will be judged by the public for their actions. “I will not feel sorry for the directors, presidents and politicians when they are called to account for the fact that they are now consciously playing stupid.”
Rotterdam
Forrest can also become important for the port of Rotterdam. Rotterdam wants to become the distribution point for hydrogen in Western Europe, as it is now for petroleum products. FFI, Forrest’s company, will not only produce this hydrogen on a large scale in Australia, but also in Norway. It would then be logical to transport that hydrogen to the hinterland via Rotterdam.
But if Rotterdam wants to be able to satisfy this new global player FFI, the Netherlands should not decide to extract some extra natural gas from the North Sea. Forrest: “What I said to London I will say to other countries. I have to invest in countries where I see good leadership.”
In his weblog ‘Vincent wants sun’, Vincent Dekker highlights innovations and developments in the field of green energy, close to and far from home. More episodes at Trouw.nl/vincentwilzon. Vincent now also has a podcast, including about heat pumps – listen to it via this link or look it up through the known channels.
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Dutch solar foil should make Australia a major hydrogen exporter
Australia, still a large and controversial exporter of coal, wants to become a very large supplier of green hydrogen. For this, the country needs solar power that is as cheap as possible. The Dutch company HyET seems to be the ideal partner for this.
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