UK-based green energy company Hive Energy (Hive), which has a major green hydrogen and green ammonia project pipeline in South Africa, has announced that it has entered a joint venture (JV) with the Transitional Energy Group (TEG), to develop the $8-billion Gente Grande green ammonia project in the Chilean part of Tierra del Fuego, at the tip of South America.

“Hive Energy is passionate about creating a greener future, contributing to decarbonisation, and achieving our net zero ambition,” affirmed group founder Giles Redpath. “We are scaling up our activities in green hydrogen and ammonia production globally and are very excited to partner with TEG for this development in Chile.”

Gente Grande will have a capacity of more than 3 GW. Utilising the wind resources found in the region – described by Hive as “unique” – it will have an annual production capacity of about 1.3-million tons of green ammonia, at low cost to customers.

Hive has successfully developed solar energy farms in Cuba, New Zealand, Spain and the UK. Regarding the production of green hydrogen and green ammonia, its focus to date has been on Spain and especially South Africa. The Chilean JV will increase the group’s renewable energy capacity to 15 GW. But it is not neglecting South Africa. Three further green hydrogen and green ammonia production project phases, at Coega, in the Eastern Cape province, are currently at the prefeasibility stage. Should they go ahead, they would increase the company’s renewable energy capacity for the production of green hydrogen and green ammonia to 33 GW.

“We believe establishing low cost, high volume green ammonia supply is critical if we are to decarbonise transport, the energy sector and other hard-to-abate or energy-intensive industries,” he highlighted. In addition to South Africa, Spain, Cuba, New Zealand, the UK and now Chile, Hive is active in more than 18 other countries. These include Brazil, Canada, Croatia, Greece, Italy and Serbia.