The company has launched its own corporate Energy Transition Department to help customers develop decarbonization solutions for industrial processes. The manager of the new area, Hernán Milberg tells us what goals and future projects the team is pursuing.

In mid-2020, the Techint Group set up its Energy Transition Unit, headed up by Andrea Rocca, as an answer to the imperative demand to decarbonize industries around the world.

A number of different directors from the Group’s companies were invited to take part, and at the time, Hernán Milberg was at working as a Project Manager for general projects in Techint E&C. Having trained as a Chemical Engineer, he knew about renewable energy sources and the use of hydrogen as a clean fuel, so he began to research what was being done in these areas around the world, focusing on what could be done to develop specific initiatives within the company. “We started developing offers, some of which later morphed into projects. As time went by, we realized there was a need to create an exclusive Engineering area dedicated to the energy transition within the company, in order to give it a differential value.”

How the department works: from Argentina to the world

After a journey spanning over two years, the Energy Transition Department was officially constituted on February 1 this year, with a team of nine people: three full-time members, and six part-time contributors, working from other offices outside Argentina.

Hernán Milberg explains that, “We’re working with the same structure as other Engineering disciplines. There’s a corporate group that deals with energy transition issues in general, and then there are specialized delegates working in the engineering offices in the Northern and Southern Areas, as well as in Seville (Spain), Milan (Italy) and Sao Paulo (Brazil). We started out with a small structure but the idea is for it to grow as more projects arise.”

Our mission: to decarbonize industries and accompany business development

The role of the Energy Transition Department is to help industries decarbonize in general and accompany the business development of the Group’s companies. Techint E&C, as an Engineering and Construction company, has a very low carbon footprint compared with other industries, such as steelmaking or electricity generation, so its role is to find ways of helping these industries to decarbonize by developing innovative projects and approaching customers in the early stages of their development to offer knowledge and management capabilities.

“There are several ways in which you can lower emissions, and we can guide customers not only from a technical point of view, but also in terms of economic and financial aspects, including permits and technology consulting,” explains Milberg.

“Leading the way”

According to Milberg, for the Techint Group, it’s critical to forge a path of leadership in the context of the Energy Transition, making it essential both to be up to speed with what’s happening around the world and to share knowledge within the company, for instance, through training activities. “We need to make our customers’ projects viable while also providing our own commercial sectors with internal support. Our job is to deliver what people need and routinely exceed their expectations, because leadership and excellence are in our genes.”

Talking about the department’s first achievements, Milberg is quick to highlight a Carbon Capture project for BASF in the USA as well as a Green Hydrogen project for Mexico, together with some renewable energy studies for Ternium and Tenaris. This includes providing Tenaris with consultancy services for the construction of the Buena Ventura Wind Farm in Gonzáles Chaves, in the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Keeping up with market trends

In Latin America, over the last two years, the opportunities to study H₂ projects have grown exponentially, particularly in Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Mexico.

"Looking towards the immediate future, I envisage several projects related to the Energy Transition kicking off in the countries where we are active. The conditions are ideal in many places due to the natural resources on offer, enabling us to produce and export products such as hydrogen, ammonia and renewable fuels, which are very much in demand around the world,” says Milberg. He adds that, “It’s very likely that we’ll soon be able to carry out our first Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) project experiences in this area. The world is already thinking green, and the younger generations are particularly interested in these issues. We have the chance to attract talent and strengthen our positioning as a cutting-edge company,” concludes Milberg.