Hydrogen development company, Hyphen Hydrogen Energy (Hyphen) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with ITOCHU Corporation (ITOCHU) to explore areas for potential collaboration between them to drive forward sub-Saharan Africa’s largest, and only, fully vertically-integrated green hydrogen project.
Hyphen and ITOCHU, one of Japan’s largest general trading and investment companies, will now enter into talks on areas of potential collaboration on Namibia’s landmark multi-billion-dollar green hydrogen project.
The agreement was signed on Tuesday by Shinya Ishizuka, ITOCHU’s CEO of Africa Bloc, and Marco Raffinetti, Hyphen’s CEO. Present also at the signing ceremony was the Japanese Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry for Japan, Nishimura Yasutoshi, and the Minister for Mines and Energy, Tom Alweendo.
Marco Raffinetti, CEO of Hyphen, said: “Hyphen expects Japan to emerge as one of the key demand centres for green ammonia globally and we are delighted to have the opportunity to explore areas for collaboration with ITOCHU to unlock supply into this critical market. I firmly believe that Namibia has the potential to become a long-term strategic partner to Japan for the supply of green hydrogen, well beyond the scale of Hyphen’s project, given Namibia’s unique competitive advantages in green hydrogen production. Combined with the support of Namibia that is progressively advancing the development of its green hydrogen economy.”
Shinya Ishizuka, CEO of Africa Bloc, ITOCHU said: “We are pleased that ITOCHU, a leading general trading and investment house in Japan, is contributing to a low-carbon society together with Hyphen. With this collaborative development of green ammonia in Namibia, ITOCHU will aim to create a wide range of ammonia value chains in various existing industrial applications as well as for future energy use and will support our clients and industries in achieving low carbonization goals focusing on Japan, Asia, and its surrounding markets. ITOCHU will initiate and enhance our industrial portfolio in the energy sector while achieving our commitments towards decarbonization activities in various prospective industries.”
Namibia and Hyphen in May this year agreed to govern the development, implementation, and operation of sub-Saharan Africa’s largest, and only fully vertically integrated, green hydrogen project.
The transformative impact of this project on Namibia and its economy is set to be considerable. The total project capital investment of US$10 billion is roughly equivalent to the country’s annual GDP and at full-scale development, anticipated before the end of the decade, the project will produce 2 million tonnes of green ammonia annually for regional and global markets.
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