TotalEnergies Antwerp adapting to energy transition challenges and markets

A key industrial site for TotalEnergies for more than 75 years, the Antwerp platform in Belgium is based on an integrated business model, which guarantees the resilience of its operations.

By adapting and investing regularly in our Antwerp site, we’re securing its long-term future and ensuring that this integrated refining and petrochemicals platform remains TotalEnergies’ most efficient in Europe. Whether the aim is to meet market challenges or contribute to decarbonization and the energy transition, the platform can be reconfigured so that it remains competitive and continues to provide jobs well into the future, said Ann Veraverbeke, Managing Director of TotalEnergies Antwerp.

Adapting to accelerate Antwerp platform decarbonization

The TotalEnergies Antwerp platform is speeding up its decarbonization with the introduction of green hydrogen.

As part of a 200 MW Air Liquide electrolyzer project, TotalEnergies has signed a tolling agreement for 130 MW dedicated to the annual production of 15,000 tonnes of green hydrogen for its Antwerp platform.

Upstream of the electrolyzer, TotalEnergies will supply green electricity to the platform thanks to its OranjeWind offshore wind project.

Scheduled for the end of 2027, the OranjeWind project will reduce carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions at the Antwerp site by up to 150,000 tonnes per annum.

Produce SAF via co-processing

With the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF),

TotalEnergies Antwerp will contribute to its aviation customers’ energy transition, helping them meet the challenge of reducing their carbon footprint with sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

An initial project to produce 50,000 tonnes of SAF per annum via coprocessing will be implemented at the Antwerp platform in 2025.

Co-processing is a SAF production method that enables the simultaneous treatment of hydrocarbons and biomass in a conventional refining unit.

Battery-based energy storage

Thanks to process electrification and battery-based energy storage, the Antwerp platform is contributing respectively to the decarbonization of its industrial operations and to the growing need to balance Belgian and European high-voltage transmission grids.

With a power rating of 25 MW and capacity of 75 MWh, Antwerp’s battery storage system is TotalEnergies’ biggest in Europe.

Commissioned last year, it helps offset the intermittency of renewable energies to encourage their development.

Address overcapacity in petrochemicals

Alongside these future-focused developments, the Antwerp platform is also facing considerable overcapacity in the petrochemicals market.

With a significant surplus of ethylene expected in Europe, TotalEnergies thus intends to cease operating its oldest steam cracker in Antwerp by end-2027.

The latter was historically dependent on a major contract with a third-party user of the ethylene produced, which recently decided not to renew it by the end of 2027.

As a result, the steam cracker, which is not integrated into TotalEnergies’ downstream polymer production, will no longer have any outlets for its ethylene production.

The unit shutdown will allow the site to focus on its more recent steam cracker, the ethylene production of which is entirely consumed by TotalEnergies’ industrial units in Antwerp and Feluy.

The reconfiguration will be conducted without any layoffs. The 253 employees concerned will each be offered a solution aligned with their situation: retirement or an internal transfer to another position based at the Antwerp site.

This project is subject to the legally required employee consultation and notification process, which TotalEnergies will initiate with representatives of Antwerp platform employees in late April 2025.