Hyundai Oilbank Rides the 'Green New Deal'... Enters Hydrogen Charging Station Business

[Asia Economy Reporter Hwang Yoon-joo] Hyundai Oilbank is the first domestic oil refining company to enter the hydrogen charging station business.

Hyundai Oilbank plans to operate 80 hydrogen charging stations by 2025 using its gas station infrastructure. It intends to gradually expand this to 180 stations by 2030 and 300 stations by 2040.

The reason Hyundai Oilbank is entering the hydrogen charging station business is part of the government's hydrogen economy activation roadmap announced last January. The government launched the Hydrogen Economy Committee in July and announced plans to supply 1,200 hydrogen charging stations by 2040.

Hyundai Oilbank currently has the capacity to produce 300,000 tons of hydrogen annually at its petrochemical plant. Petrochemical companies generate by-product hydrogen when producing ethylene and propylene. Hyundai Oilbank plans to actively sell the by-product hydrogen generated at the HPC plant, a naphtha cracking facility to be completed in 2021 through Hyundai Chemical, a joint venture established last year with Lotte Chemical, to hydrogen charging stations.

Hydrogen charging station infrastructure is key, and the acquisition of SK Networks' directly operated gas stations in May is also seen as a momentum for the new business. With this acquisition, Hyundai Oilbank became the oil refining company with the most directly operated gas stations nationwide (about 400 locations).

An industry insider said, "The biggest issue in the refining industry this year is British Petroleum (BP) declaring carbon neutrality and ExxonMobil being removed from the Dow Jones Industrial Average," adding, "This is a symbolic event showing that oil refining companies will inevitably have to strengthen eco-friendly businesses such as renewable energy in the future."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.