Breaking fossil dependence

The Land and Environment Court at Vänersborg District Court in Vänersborg, Sweden, has granted a changed environmental permit for Perstorp´s chemical plant in Stenungsund to allow for the production of more sustainable methanol. Perstorp sought the changed permit to enable the implementation of its Project Air initiative, due to be commissioned at the end of 2026. The permit also includes construction and operation of an electrolysis plant for the production of hydrogen.

In one of the flagship projects of the energy transition, the Swedish “Project Air", implementation is moving full steam ahead. Uniper has commissioned the Dresden-based company Sunfire to build a 30 MW pressurized alkaline electrolysis plant which will generate green hydrogen using renewable electricity and purified wastewater. The final investment decision is still pending.

Perstorp has selected Johnson Matthey to provide the methanol license and engineering services for Project Air. This is the first step towards constructing the plant that will provide 200 000 tonnes of sustainable methanol for chemical production, thereby enabling a big step towards breaking fossil dependence of the chemical industry.

Project Air is an industrial initiative to transform the chemical industry towards climate neutrality, with far-reaching effects throughout industrial value chains. Perstorp Group and Uniper will produce sustainable methanol for chemical manufacturing using circular production methods, thereby reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 500,000 tons per year, corresponding to the annual emissions of around 340,000 new cars running on fossil fuel.

Project Air was initiated by Perstorp in 2019. In 2020 Perstorp partnered with Uniper to secure the supply of green hydrogen.  

Representatives from Perstorp, Uniper and CINEA (European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency) met today to officially sign the agreement granting the project support from the Innovation Fund. The agreement states that Project Air will receive EUR 97 million in support to enable its ground-breaking technology, which is a critical enabler for the European chemicals industry to become carbon-neutral.  

Project Air, an industrial collaboration to build a unique production facility for sustainable methanol in Stenungsund, Sweden, will receive EUR 97 million in support from the EU Innovation Fund. The announcement marks an important milestone for the project, which is being led by chemicals company Perstorp AB. The facility is expected to be fully operational by 2026, enabling significantly reduced climate emissions from the chemicals industry and its customers.

The European Union Innovation Fund has selected Project Air as one of 17 large-scale green tech projects to be granted more than EUR 1.8 billion. Project Air, which is a collaboration between Perstorp, Fortum and Uniper, has applied for EUR 97 million and the total investment is expected to amount to more than EUR 230 million.

Project Air is an industrial concept to produce methanol from a large variety of recovered end-of-life streams and hydrogen from electrolysis. The project is carried out by the Swedish chemical group Perstorp in cooperation with Uniper (Germany) and Fortum (Finland), and the aim is to reduce carbon emissions by up to half million tons annually. Project Air has now been allocated approximately EUR 30 million by the Swedish Energy Agency.