Fortescue Future Industries has been on the lips of many ASX market watchers this week, but there’s still some uncertainty over what it really does.
In a nutshell, Fortescue Future Industries was created by its parent company, Fortescue Metals Group Limited(ASX: FMG), to house a portfolio of renewable projects and activities. It hopes to help Fortescue Metals reach carbon-neutrality by 2030.
The iron producer’s green branch has hit the headlines this week on the back of its planned Global Green Energy Manufacturing Centre.
But, aside from the planned electrolyser factory, what does Fortescue Future Industries do? Let’s take a look.
What does Fortescue Future Industries do?
Fortescue Metal’s green-focused subsidiary has several projects on the go, each focused on climate-friendly energy production.
It’s looking into building green hydrogen production plants in New Zealand, India, and Brazil.
It’s also working with the Indonesian government to study the potential of using the country’s hydropower and geothermal resources to produce large-scale renewable energy.
But that’s not all. Here’s what else Fortescue Future Industries has on its plate.
Global Green Energy Manufacturing Centre
First is, of course, the Global Green Energy Manufacturing Centre. Construction on the centre, located in Gladstone, will begin early next year.
To begin with, the centre will focus on producing electrolysers — equipment needed to split hydrogen from water. But Fortescue Future Industries hopes the centre will do far more than that.
Following the first stage of construction, the centre will be producing wind turbines, electric cabling, and solar photovoltaic cells, as well as related infrastructure.
HyET
Just last week, Fortescue Future Industries bought a 60% stake in the Dutch High yield Energy Technologies (HyET) Group.
The group is made up of HyET Solar and HyET Hydrogen, the latter of which is expected to help Fortescue Future Industries reach its goal of producing 15 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030.
Fortescue Future Industries is also financing the majority of HyET Solar’s Dutch Solar PV factory’s expansion.
Green ammonia
In addition to green hydrogen, Fortescue Future Industries is planning to create green ammonia.
The company is investigating the potential to build a 250-megawatt hydrogen production plant in Tasmania, which will also be capable of producing 250,000 tonnes of green ammonia each year.
Additionally, Fortescue Future Industries announced yesterday it has partnered with Australia’s largest fertiliser supplier, Incitec Pivot. Together, they are looking at converting Incitec’s Brisbane-based ammonia-production facility to run on green hydrogen.
Fortescue Future Industries also plans to build an electrolysis plant on-site. The plant could produce 50,000 tonnes of green hydrogen annually, which might be converted into green ammonia.
Fortescue Future Industries has also signed a memorandum of understanding with IHI Engineering Australia and IHI Corporation. The 3 companies have teamed up to investigate green ammonia supply chains between Australia and Japan.
