Pensana plc (London) and Equinor Energy AS (Stavanger, Norway) have signed a cooperation agreement to form a working group to share technical and commercial information to develop a low energy method for recycling of end-of-life magnets at Pensana’s rare earth hub in Saltend Chemical Park in the U.K.
Pensana’s Chairman, Paul Atherley, commented: “We are establishing a world-class, independent and sustainable, rare earth processing facility at Saltend Chemicals Park. We are also looking to process end-of-life magnets from wind turbine nacelles using hydrogen’s properties as a powerful reductant. We very much look forward to working with Equinor using hydrogen from the H2H Saltend project in establishing this innovative process route as a key component in the circular economy for rare earth magnets in the U.K.”
The partnership with Equinor supports Pensana’s commitment to the circular economy as it looks to recycle an addressable annual market of 4,000 tons of end-of-life permanent magnets. Recycling permanent magnets utilizing hydrogen not as fuel, but as a reductant, whilst benefitting from the decarbonized power supply within Saltend, offers a clean alternative using 88% less energy than virgin magnet manufacture and aligns with Pensana’s continued efforts to produce a sustainable supply chain for these critical materials.
Equinor has submitted plans for its ‘Hydrogen to Humber (H2H) Saltend’ hydrogen production facility into phase two of the Government’s Cluster Sequencing Process. The facility will be supported by the potential supply of hydrogen to Pensana and other regional hydrogen users ,which could be a world first and a catalyst for the Humber to achieve net zero.