Business students help power growth of green energy firm

A student team from Northumbria University’s Business Clinic is helping a pioneering renewable energy company to power its growth by capitalising on the emerging e-methanol market.

Lhyfe is a producer and supplier of green hydrogen, which can be combined with carbon dioxide to make e-methanol – a low-carbon fuel used principally by the maritime industry. Hydrogen can also be used to power other industries including glass, chemicals, cement, steelmaking and other forms of transport such as buses and trucks.

Headquartered in Nantes in France, Lhyfe has around 200 staff and a site at Wallsend, which aims to become a major regional supplier to industries in the North East of England.

The Business Clinic students were tasked with developing a business development strategy for Lhyfe to provide hydrogen for the e-methanol market in the UK – but after initial conversations between the company and the students, they decided to widen the scope of the brief.

Ross Bell, student project lead, said: “Initially our brief from Lhyfe was to explore opportunities in the UK e-methanol market but our research highlighted a need to cast the net wider. Shell, a competitor, are already exploring ways of supplying green hydrogen for the production of e-methanol in the Netherlands, for example, and European Energy already have an e-methanol plant in operation in Denmark. So we decided to look at international markets in northern Europe as well as the UK market.” 

On the back of their extensive research, the students highlighted the Port of Tyne and ports in IJmuiden and Gothenburg as priority sites for investment.

The Port of Tyne is an independent trust port, where all profits are invested back into the port for the benefit of stakeholders, so this gives it licence to invest in green energy infrastructure and build partnerships with other like-minded port owners. The port has formed an alliance with the Port of Ijmuiden just north of Amsterdam to create a “green corridor”, a fully decarbonised shipping route between the two ports – enabling Lhyfe to benefit from both ends of the corridor.

The Port of Gothenburg in Sweden was also deemed an attractive investment proposition as it is the largest port in the Nordics and a central hub for imports and exports.

Boris Davis, UK Business Lead at Lhyfe, said: “I would absolutely recommend the Business Clinic and its students to other companies and organisations looking for help with real-world business challenges. Ours is a fairly sizeable business and our challenge was a key piece of work tackling some big infrastructure. It must have been very challenging for the students to take on a project such as this and it’s safe to say that it hasn’t been easy or straightforward. I was so impressed with the students, though, and I think they navigated their way through the project very well.”

Students work at the Business Clinic in their final year of study, offering clients a full consultancy experience that encompasses activities as diverse as feasibility studies including finance, investment and growth; HR including recruitment, retention and diversity; marketing including branding and digital; business analytics; logistics and supply chain management. The aim of each project is to undertake research and make recommendations that will benefit organisations in the short and long term.

Ed Cottam, director of the Business Clinic, said: “The students applied themselves impressively to a very technical project and we’ve had some terrific feedback from Boris and the team at Lhyfe. Our work enables organisations such as Lhyfe to access fresh ideas, skills and talent that helps them solve real-world problems or add value to their business in other ways.”

The Business Clinic has delivered 870 consultancy projects involving more than 3,500 students across all business subjects since it was founded in 2013. It offers pro-bono consultancy support to SMEs, multi-national organisations, charitable organisations, educational trusts and social enterprises that operate across a wide range of sectors, both in the North East of England as well as further afield in the UK and overseas.