Inward-investing rare earth processor Pensana has secured a route to powering its energy intensive operations from offshore wind.
The company, behind consented plans for a complex chemical plant to produce magnet metals at Saltend, is aiming to tap into the electricity landed onshore in East Yorkshire from turbines in the near North Sea.
It has signed a letter of intent with neighbouring Yorkshire Energy Park for a private wire connection to battery storage developed there.
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The emerging development, with proposals for 200MW of battery storage, sits alongside the onshore substation for RWE’s Humber Gateway offshore wind farm - with the Cottingham grid connection for the emerging Dogger Bank zone also eyed.
Pensana is eyeing up access to 4MW, rising to 10MW for a 10 year period.
It would power the £150 million separation facility, where 125 jobs will be created, then later the conversion of the retrieved oxides to metals in what would be a world first.
Pensana chairman Paul Atherley said: “Through the private wire connection to Yorkshire Energy Park our aim is to become the world’s lowest carbon magnet metal producer, with Pensana becoming the first company globally to use offshore wind to produce ultra-low carbon magnet metal.
“In our off-take discussions with the major automotive original equipment manufacturers there is increasing importance being placed on the security of supply and low-embedded carbon. Producing an ultra-low carbon magnet metal further enhances Saltend in its rapidly growing importance in the European and US magnet metal supply chains.”
Yorkshire Energy Park, the £200 million proposal for the former Hedon aerodrome site, east of Hull and immediately north of Saltend, has been brought forward by a consortium led by Sewell Group, under the banner Hull Eco Parks Ltd, with Eco Parks Development, a sister business of Hessle’s MS3 Networks, and New Technology Developments Ltd, an investment arm of Chiltern Group.
It would house the capability for industrial consumers to access green energy, with data centres and other plans for the 212-acre site where it is hoped almost 5,000 jobs could eventually be created.
Chris Turner, chairman of Yorkshire Energy Park, said: “YEP is delighted to be working with Pensana on the world’s first rare earth processing hub to be powered by offshore wind. The future for energy in the Humber Estuary is very exciting and YEP is at the forefront of the drive to zero-carbon.”
It comes just days after Equinor and SSE Thermal agreed a deal to buy Triton Power, the company behind the gas-fired power plant at Saltend.
That is to be fuel-switched to hydrogen, with Equinor bringing production to a neighbouring plot as part of wider plans for the Humber heavy industry cluster.
Pensana could not just benefit from offshore wind power, but it is eyed as a key client too - with plans in place to recycle turbines at the end of their life cycle to ensure the reuse of precious metals.
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