Industrial gases giant Linde has announced that it will invest $1.8bn in a new blue hydrogen plant in Texas that will supply both H2 and nitrogen to Dutch fertiliser and methanol producer OCI for the production of blue ammonia.

The UK-headquartered company will build, own and operate the facility in Beaumont, Texas, which will produce blue hydrogen from natural gas using the autothermal reforming (ATR) process, paired with carbon capture and storage (CCS).

The hydrogen will be used to produce 1.1 million tonnes of blue ammonia per year at OCI’s new blue ammonia plant in Beaumont, while sequestering more than 1.7 million tonnes of CO2 per year — presumably via the CCS project that Linde is developing with BP.