Kimberly-Clark Goes Green in North Wales with Renewable Energy for Tissue Manufacturing

HYRO - a joint venture between RES and Octopus Energy Generation – has submitted a planning application to Flintshire County Council for its Coleshill Green Hydrogen Project. The scheme is one of two projects located on existing Kimberly-Clark sites which aim to assist the roll out of this reliable, and cost-competitive source of power for industrial businesses.

The Coleshill Green Hydrogen Project comprises a Green Hydrogen Electrolyser production and storage facility on land near Kimberly-Clark’s Coleshill paper mill, off Aber Road, Flint, CH6 5EP.

It will use electricity from renewable sources to split water using electrolysis and create green hydrogen to fuel a new hydrogen ready boiler, located inside the mill. This new boiler produces the steam and heat necessary for the paper manufacturing process at the mill and will replace the current boiler which is fueled by only natural gas.

Green hydrogen projects are a critical component of the broader strategy to deliver energy security and create green economic growth across Wales and the UK. Green hydrogen can help to address the urgent need to decarbonize industrial businesses and hard to electrify sectors, setting them up with a cost competitive, clean fuel for the future.”

Iain Buchanan, Development Project Manager, Coleshill Green Hydrogen Project, HYRO

Oriol Margo, Sustainability Transformation Leader, Kimberly-Clark EMEA added: “This development at our Coleshill Site in Flint and our partnership with HYRO represents a huge step towards our ambition to move solely to renewable energy to manufacture Andrex, Kleenex, Huggies, WypAll and Scott in the UK by 2030.”

The submission follows pre-application consultation (PAC) undertaken by HYRO in April and May 2023 which enabled specific statutory consultees and members of the public alike, to view details of the proposals, ask questions and provide comments. Following the PAC, HYRO has examined the comments received and taken these into consideration before finalizing the design in their planning application.