Japan NRG sat down with Takahashi Kenji, GM of the Decarbonization Promotion Section at JERA’s Corporate Strategy Dept. to discuss what Japan’s biggest thermal power utility and top importer of LNG thinks about the development of ammonia / hydrogen and other energy issues. We also talked about the future of CCS, JERA’s outlook for Southeast Asia, and how the company sees “carbon neutral” LNG. An extract of the interview is below.

You announced the world’s biggest global tender for ammonia — to provide 0.5 million tons a year. How was the response?

We asked about 30 companies to submit proposals. We received proposals from almost all of them. Actually, since we made the tender information public, we received interest from more than twice as many companies. In total, nearly 100 companies expressed interest. However, we will be closely examining their proposals to see how much they can realistically supply and at what price. We will then deepen our discussions in order to conclude a proper contract.

What’s your early impression of the prices offered?

We see that the price of the underlying raw material, for example in the case of blue ammonia it’s natural gas, will be affected by when supply actually starts. So, first we need to determine the conditions under which that gas will be supplied and the basis of its long-term price. It’s not a simple matter of evaluating the offers as high or low at this point.