A.P. Moller-Maersk will partner with authorities in Egypt to explore the large-scale production of green fuel for ships in the country.
Maersk announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Monday in a joint bid to further accelerate the supply of green fuels for ships as part of the shipping industry’s transition to net-zero.
The MoU, signed with the Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCZone), the Egyptian New and Renewable Energy Authority (NREA), the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company (EETC), and the Sovereign Fund of Egypt for Investment and Development (TSFE), follows six fuel sourcing partnerships announced earlier this month. The SCZone includes ports and industrial parks around the Suez Canal.
“Egypt has excellent conditions for renewable energy production and ambitions to become global leader in the green energy value chain,” said Henriette Hallberg Thygesen, CEO of Fleet & Strategic Brands at Maersk.
“We are very excited to be able to explore options together, drawing on our more than 100 years of business relations in the country.”
“The availability of green energy and fuel in sufficient quantities and at cost competitive price levels is the single biggest challenge to the decarbonisation of global shipping. For Maersk, our recently announced strategic partnerships with six industry leading companies are key in addressing this challenge, but to stay on the 1.5-degree pathway even more scale is needed within this decade. That is what this partnership is exploring,” Thygesen added.
The parties will be conducting a feasibility study before the end of this year to examine an Egypt-based hydrogen and green marine fuel production powered by renewable energy. Maersk will be the committed offtaker of any fuel produced.
“Capitalizing on Egypt’s fundamentals and vision, SCZONE’s strategic integrated areas of ports and industrial parks around the Suez Canal, and leveraging on the solid and enduring longstanding relationship we have with Maersk, I am looking forward to the evolvement of this project, which meets our mutual target of transforming into the green economy,” said Eng.Yhia Zaki, Chairman of the SCZone.
Ayman Soliman, CEO of the Sovereign Fund of Egypt, said, “This partnership presents a unique opportunity to strengthen a longstanding relationship with a key strategic partner to the Egyptian Government over the last 100 years. Specifically for The Sovereign Fund of Egypt, this potential opportunity adds a new dimension to our roadmap towards zero emission targets. Maersk’s bid to accelerate the supply of green fuels and the global transformation to net-zero shipping will expand the Suez Canal’s service offering as a main global hub for green bunkering in the region.”
Maersk said it intends to explore similar opportunities in other regions of the globe.
Copyright Ships & Ports Ltd. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit given to www.shipsandports.com.ng as the source.
