A slew of announcements came from companies in the Aker holding today, but the most important Aker stock news is that Aker Clean Hydrogen pushed ahead with new global projects and prospects. The hydrogen value chain integrator of Aker Horizons, published its Q2 and first half of 2021 results on July 12th, showing it is realizing its ambitions to accelerate clean energy production.
Aker Horizons is a dedicated investment company, incubating and developing planet-positive initiatives, with the majority stake owned by Aker ASA. Aker Horizons launched in February 2021 Aker Clean Hydrogen – a company building and operating clean hydrogen projects, leveraging domain expertise across Aker Group.
The company exists to facilitate the maturing of clean energy technologies like green ammonia and green hydrogen production from natural gas. Aker Clean Hydrogen has a goal to reach a 5 GW net installed capacity of established clean energy projects by 2030.
“In just a few months, we have established projects and prospects with a net capacity of more than 1.7 GW in Norway, Chile and Uruguay, so we are heading steadily towards our 2030 target of reaching 5 GW net installed capacity,” highlighted Knut Nyborg CEO of Aker Clean Hydrogen from the earnings results.
Aker Stock: First Half Of 2021
Aker Clean Hydrogen stock is trading 2.85% higher today after the release of first-half and second-quarter results. The revenue came at $114,634 (or NOK 1 million) and operating loss – almost 60 times higher at $6,878,070 (or NOK 60 million). The cash balance is positive – $323 million (NOK 2 828 million).
The high operating loss is referred to costs related to the start of the company. It reflects the expenses of building and developing global projects including standardization, digitalization, project execution model, and supply chain.
Second Quarter Results
In the second quarter, the company reached a couple of milestones. Apart from building the Aker Clean Hydrogen team by recruiting talent, it also marked progress with four of its projects, mostly dedicated to green ammonia production.
The company matured the Herøya project to build a green ammonia plant with partners Yara and Statkraft at Yara’s fertilizer plant. Ammonia is considered the most promising hydrogen carrier and zero-carbon shipping fuel.
It completed the feasibility study and concept phase for the Berlevåg project. It utilizes local wind resources aiming to decarbonize shipping in the Arctic. The project is a joint venture with Varanger Kraft.
Aker Clean Hydrogen also signed a memorandum of understanding with CapeOmega for the development of a large-scale hydrogen production facility using natural gas in Norway.
It also announced separately today that Shell will join the project that the companies called the Aukra Hydrogen Hub. Shell already has strong connections in the region with other clean energy projects like the Northern Lights.
The quarterly results also boosted the long-term prospects of the company and thus Aker stock. The CEO of Aker Clean Hydrogen announced future plans for growth include dialogues with large offtakers, infrastructure companies, and renewable energy providers – most of them already maturing, that are expected to grow its pipeline and existing projects over the coming quarters.
Aker Carbon Capture
Aker Carbon Capture is a carbon capture company with more than 20 years of carbon capture technology development experience as part of the Aker Group. It announced on July 12th the launch of carbon capture as a service – Carbon capture made easy™. The service will be an integrated offering covering everything related to reducing emissions by CCS.
Some of the services offered will include:
- delivering and operating carbon capture facilities
- transport and storage of CO2, embedded through strategic partnerships
- handling contracts for each step of the carbon capture development process
“Many companies that want to reduce emissions through CCS have been held back by the complexity and commitment required to act. This is carbon capture made easy; commercially viable CCS,” said Valborg Lundegaard, CEO of Aker Carbon Capture.
Aker Carbon Capture will offer taking care of all interfaces and contracts as one single service, where the customer will pay per ton of CO2 captured. Apart from integrating the full value chain of carbon capture technology development and operation, it aims to accelerate cost reduction.
Aker Carbon Capture plans to yield a separate company to provide the required investments for building and owning the carbon capture plants. It will be established by Aker Horizons together with Aker Carbon Capture and will invite third-party capital. The solution will optimize the cost of capital overall, offering competitive carbon capture building and operations business models.
Aker stock’s recent news shows the holding is bringing clean energy steps further to enable the deployment of large-scale decarbonization technologies. Aker Carbon Capture will not only accelerate the carbon capture market but also offer a viable solution to a sector that is skyrocketing in demand – carbon dioxide removal.
Aker Clean Hydrogen will support decarbonization targets across industries while deploying hydrogen as a potential fuel source that could replace fossil fuels.
