Trafigura issues tenders for Port Pirie hydrogen plant

The firm behind a $750m project in the SA town has released documents that will kick off the next phase of its ambitious power play.

Trafigura has issued key tenders for its proposed $750m hydrogen project at Port Pirie and kicked off community consultation ahead of a final investment decision by potentially the end of this year.

Trafigura, which owns Nyrstar – the operator of the city’s lead smelter – announced late last year it had started an engineering study into the project, which once fully scaled-up would be able to produce 100 tonnes per day of green hydrogen from a 440 megawatt (MW) electrolyser.

Tim Rogers, Trafigura’s general manager-Australia, was in Port Pirie last week to meet with locals, conducting a drop in session and two community consultation sessions to answer questions about the planned project.

Mr Rogers said the company had also recently put out the major tender for the hydrogen electrolyser, as well as the ammonia plant tender.

“The front end engineering and design process, or FEED, is probably at about half way,’’ he said.

Nyrstar’s Port Pirie lead smelter. Picture: David Mariuz

While the two major tenders were released recently, other, smaller tenders have already been issued and responses received back.

“The two key pieces of infrastructure – electrolysers and ammonia, have been issued,’’ Mr Rogers said.

Mr Rogers said while the company had made its own cost estimates, the tenders would give it more certainty about the overall cost of the project.

From now, the team working on the project would bring together data on constructions costs, financing, power, possible state and federal government support and other matters, which would be presented to the Trafigura board.

“In terms of timeline we’re probably looking at late this year, early next year, to go to the board for a final investment decision,’’ Mr Rogers said.

“There will be a period after that to go to financial close, in the order of three to six months, and then we can be looking at starting construction.’’

Mr Rogers said the community consultation conducted this week was positive, with plenty of questions from attendees.

The facility, which would be built next to the current smelter, would initially include an 85MW electrolyser, before ramping up in stages to 440MW, which currently would be the world’s largest such facility.

The hydrogen would be exported as ammonia for use in export markets, while the oxygen produced would be used by the lead smelter.

Longer term there is also the possibility of developing a hydrogen fuel supply business feeding into the heavy transport sector, the company has previously said.

The project would create 150-300 jobs during construction and up to 25 ongoing roles.

The previous state government contributed $5m towards the FEED study.