Royal Dutch Shell on Thursday said it would stop processing crude oil at its Rheinland refinery in Wesseling, Germany, as part of its zero-carbon push. The site will be converted into Shell Energy and Chemicals Park Rheinland that will focus on producing green hydrogen, sustainable aviation fuels (SAF), and bio-LNG.
The 150,000 bpd Wesseling refinery is one of two sites within the 340,000 bpd Shell Rheinland complex. Godorf, the other site, will continue processing crude into oil products under the plans. Shell said it would try to avoid redundancies for the plant’s 3,000 workforces during the conversion programme by offering early retirement, retraining, or switching to other positions.
While Shell has not reached a final investment decision for the project, it has secured European Union funding. The project will include scaling up an existing 10 MW hydrogen electrolysis plant to 100 MW as well as plants to produce SAF and renewable bio-based naphtha.
