LG Chem Ltd. said Monday it is building a hydrogen plant in South Korea to produce clean fuel for use in its key petrochemical processing in line with its long-term low carbon emission goals.

The hydrogen plant, to be located in its Daesan complex, about 75 kilometers southwest of Seoul, will have an annual capacity of 50,000 tons by the second quarter of 2024, with the construction to start in the first half of 2023, the chemical company said in a release.

It will be LG Chem's first plant to produce pure hydrogen, aside from that produced from existing processing facilities as off-gases, it said.

The new plant will convert methane that comes from the naphtha cracking center (NCC) to hydrogen through a chemical reaction under high-temperature steam. That hydrogen will be used as fuel for the naphtha cracking process that produces basic petrochemical feedstocks.

Methane is used as a heat source in the NCC process, blamed for emitting a large amount of carbon dioxide.

By replacing methane with high-purity hydrogen that does not emit carbon dioxide, it will be able to reduce carbon emissions by 140,000 tons annually once the plant becomes fully operational -- equivalent to planting 1 million trees, LG Chem said.

LG Chem plans to increase the use of renewable energy, such as hydrogen, in the NCC process by up to 70 percent by 2025. (Yonhap)