A new capacity to produce hydrogen energy could be built on the Oltchim Râmnicu Vâlcea platform, following an investment of between 0.5-1 billion euros, said businessman Stefan Vuza, the owner of the petrochemical plant.

The hydrogen plant would be financed from European funds, through the Green Deal and the Energy Efficiency Fund. This could be a country project, Romania will be among the first states in the European Union where such a capacity would exist, Vuza said, according to Agerpres.

“In 2018, Chimcomplex took a loan from the London financial market and we bought all the assets from Râmnicu Vâlcea, with 164 million euros and now we believe that the merger process is over, although only 80% we are on target, but looks good. The two plants are in a synergy, they work together and we have started the necessary investment programs from the very first year. We knew them from pre-acquisition audits.

We can say that we invested 40 million euro in the first three years and up to now, while this year – this is the third, a new polyol section will be put into operation, according to the latest technologies. Especially the digitalization we were talking about, we also start to apply it. So it’s good, we’re on the right track, investments are underway, the area is very dynamic and there are a lot of opportunities to grow.

This – given that Oltchim has the necessary experience for such a project, as here there is already a research institute in hydrogen and cryogenics, and the plant also has the possibility to capture carbon dioxide. Oltchim aims to attract other players from the Romanian chemical industry, such as Azomureş, Terapia and the profile faculties,” he said.