Many of the factors that made Eastern Canada attractive for LNG projects, including deep-sea ports and relative proximity to markets, also bode well for exporting green hydrogen, made with water electrolysis powered by renewable energy. Proponents hope the nascent hydrogen economy in this region can succeed where LNG largely failed.
EverWind Fuels and Bear Head Energy lead the two most advanced green hydrogen projects on Canada’s east coast. The hydrogen they plan to produce would be converted to ammonia, a molecule much easier to transport than pure hydrogen that can also utilize much of the world’s LNG terminal and tanker fleet. There are around 20 companies considering hydrogen projects of various sizes in Atlantic Canada, including more than a dozen in Nova Scotia, insiders say.
Key Ingredients
Both companies share distinct first-mover advantages enhanced by existing infrastructure. Their respective projects are each located at Point Tupper, Nova Scotia — the deepest ice-free prt on the east coast of North America — and much of the groundwork laid for LNG and other energy trade will speed up hydrogen development, the companies say. Friendly policies and incentives for hydrogen at the national and provincial level will also be a tailwind.
The biggest advantage hydrogen has in this region compared to LNG is the ready availability of the key inputs, namely freshwater and clean power. LNG’s fatal flaw was the difficulty getting gas from producing basins in Western Canada and the US to the planned liquefaction facilities; building a multibillion-dollar pipeline from these regions to Nova Scotia proved too costly and politically complicated to be feasible. “My main feedstock is water. All of that’s in my backyard, as opposed to across the country or down in the [US],” Bear Head Managing Director Paul MacLean tells Energy Intelligence.
Offtake Outlook
EverWind is building a $6 billion, 1 million ton per year hydrogen and ammonia plant at a storage terminal it acuired in 2022 from NuStar Energy. It signed a memorandum of understanding last year with German utilities Uniper and E.ON for each to offtake 500,000 tons/yr of green ammonia and is now in “advanced” discussions to finalize those agreements, CEO Trent Vichie tells Energy Intelligence. It’s permitted for 2 gigawatts of electrolyzer capacity and aims to launch its first phase by 2025. EverWind is also planning another green fuels plant on the Burin Peninsula in Newfoundland.
Bear Head, a subsidiary of US-based midstream player Buckeye Partners, has not announced any offtake agreements to date for its project. But MacLean says the company has received “a lot of inbound interest” from potential offtakers in Europe since getting its environmental assessment approved in April. Bear Head is also permitted for up to 2 GW of electrolyzers, which will enable it to produce up to 350,000 tons/yr of hydrogen and 2 million tons/yr of ammonia once fully ramped up. The first phase, with about 800 megwatts of electrolyzer capacity, is expected to cost $1.5 billion and start up by early 2029.
Laying Groundwork
Vichie says EverWind has already spent around $160 million repurposing the 7.8 million-barrel NuStar terminal, which was designed primarily to store refined petroleum products. The company controls about 3,000 acres with potential for some 10 GW of electrolyzers, which would be enough capacity for roughly 20 million tons/yr of green ammonia, Vichie says. The plan is to eventually convert the site into a green fuels hub for hydrogen-based products like e-methanol and sustainable aviation fuel, he adds.
Bear Head, for its part, embodies Nova Scotia’s shift from LNG to hydrogen. MacLean led a previous company in the early 2000s that sought to import LNG at the same site on Point Tupper. In 2004, that company sold to Anadarko Petroleum, which poured some $200 million into the site. LNG Ltd. bought the site from Anadarko in 2014 with a plan to export LNG but ended up going into eceivership in 2020. MacLean and his partner re-acquired the site in 2021 with a plan to “move into the green-fuels space.” Anadarko’s previous investment and engineering work “created an opportunity for us,” MacLean says. “It’s really a shovel-ready project.”
Powering Up
Power supply looks to be the largest upstream hurdle for both companies, but each sees Nova Scotia as advantaged here as well.
“Nova Scotia has some of the best offshore wind in the world,” Vichie says, citing an estimated 40 GW of potential capacity from fixed-bottom farms and perhaps many times that for floating wind. Last week, EverWind said it had bought three wind-farm developments with combined capacity of 530 MW to power the first phase of its hydrogen project.
Bear Head is still finalizing its power contracts, MacLean says. But he notes Nova Scotia’s plans to hold a Call for Bids in 2025 to develop 5 GW of offshore wind by 2030. With a relatively low population base in the province, MacLean says, “hydrogenis definitely the route to monetizing the offshore wind resource.”
