INTERVIEW: Gas power bridges present reliability with future sustainability

Zawya

2 days ago

While gas power continues to anchor the Middle East's energy mix with its reliability, dispatchability, and lower emissions, it is evolving from its traditional baseload role to serve as a crucial bridge fuel driving the region's renewable energy expansion, said Javier Cavada, President & CEO for EMEA at Mitsubishi Power. the power solutions brand of Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.
'As solar and wind introduce variability into the grid, gas turbines provide the responsiveness needed to stabilise it, ensuring consistent, uninterrupted power,' he told Zawya Projects.
Cavada said Mitsubishi Power's J-Series Air-Cooled (JAC) turbines—offering 99.5 percent reliability, over 64 percent efficiency, and hydrogen co-firing capability—are gaining traction in the region. Currently able to operate with 30 percent hydrogen blends, the turbines are targeted for 100 percent hydrogen combustion by 2030.
'Gas is giving us the best of both worlds by providing the reliability and security to meet today's power needs and the agility to support tomorrow's cleaner systems,' he said. 'This positions them not only as transitional assets, but as a 'here to stay' long-term solution for power generation.'
With 60 years of presence in the MENA region, Mitsubishi Power has been expanding its local presence and capabilities to be closer to customers and to better support rising demand through technological innovation and operational excellence, noted Cavada.
In the UAE, Mitsubishi Power operates a state-of-the-art facility in Abu Dhabi's Industrial City, servicing and maintaining rotors, hot gas parts, and other turbine equipment for clients such as ADNOC. In Saudi Arabia, it runs Saudi Aramco-accredited service and repair centres in Dammam for rotors and gas turbine components.
'We are now taking this a step further and building a gas turbine assembly plant in Dammam for our advanced, high-efficiency M501 gas turbines,' the Mitsubishi Power executive said. 'This is an example of our commitment to the region. Once operational, this facility will reduce electricity generation costs and improve delivery times.'
Mitsubishi Power is also investing in developing local talent in Saudi Arabia, where its National Programme supports the Kingdom's iktva initiative by providing structured training in both the Kingdom and Japan to prepare the next generation of Saudi energy professionals.
Cavada said the company is contributing to Saudi Arabia's 2060 net-zero goals by helping partners such as SEC and Saudi Aramco meet their power needs efficiently through clean solutions, including hydrogen-ready gas turbine technologies.
'These partnerships and initiatives underscore our broader strategy, which is to strengthen local manufacturing, service, and R&D capabilities while driving sustainable development,' he explained. 'By building these competencies, we are not only meeting the region's energy needs but also contributing to economic growth, job creation, and long-term resilience.'
Excerpts from the interview:
What is driving the current demand for gas turbines in the region? Are traditional factors such as baseload and industrial demand still dominant, or are newer drivers emerging?
According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), electricity demand in the MENA region is expected to double by 2030, and this growth is being fueled by a combination of longstanding fundamentals and emerging trends. Traditional drivers like population growth, urbanisation, industrial expansion, and the need for dependable baseload power remain critical. These factors continue to shape infrastructure planning across the region.
But at the same time, we are also witnessing an explosion in demand from AI and data centres. These facilities require extremely high levels of reliability, often 99.9 percent uptime or more, which leaves zero margin for power disruption. Gas turbines, with their proven reliability and fast response capabilities, are uniquely positioned to support this digital infrastructure.
Simultaneously, the deployment of renewables is creating a growing need for flexible backup power. Because solar and wind are inherently intermittent, gas turbines serve as the perfect complement, able to respond quickly when renewable output dips, ensuring uninterrupted power supply.
In parallel, the gas power sector is undergoing transformation with a growing shift toward a cleaner fuel mix, such as hydrogen co-firing, where hydrogen is blended with natural gas to reduce carbon intensity. In this way, the region is laying the groundwork for a cleaner, more flexible energy system that meets both today's reliability needs and tomorrow's climate goals.
How is Mitsubishi Power developing and deploying technologies such as hydrogen-ready gas turbines to support the shift toward cleaner baseload generation?
A key limitation of solar and wind power is their dependence on weather and their intermittent output. Every megawatt of renewable electricity requires an equivalent megawatt of backup—whether through storage, grid interconnections, or quickly dispatchable thermal power plants. Hydrogen, which is high in energy density and dispatchable like natural gas, is emerging as a cornerstone of the low-carbon future, with little to no emissions.
Mitsubishi Power is at the forefront of this transition as the first company to commercialise hydrogen globally, and we are already playing a key role in shaping the hydrogen economy. We already validated 50 percent hydrogen blending in a commercial project, which is Georgia Power's McDonough-Atkinson power station. Not too far in Utah, the ACES Delta project is being completed becoming the world's largest advanced clean energy hydrogen storage project and the largest renewable energy hub dedicated to producing, storing, and delivering green hydrogen at scale.
The ACES Delta facility will utilise Mitsubishi Power's validated gas turbines in a combined hydrogen cycle, delivering 1.6 gigawatts (GW) of renewable hydrogen storage capacity to Los Angeles. The project will initially use a 50 percent hydrogen and 50 percent natural gas blend to fuel its gas turbines, with the goal of transitioning to 100 percent hydrogen by 2045 or sooner.
We are also bringing these state-of-the-art gas turbines to the MENA region to support its broader decarbonisation goals. For example, the SATORP power plant currently being built in Saudi Arabia to power one of the world's largest petrochemical plants, will use our M501JAC gas turbines capable of hydrogen blending today. This is a key achievement towards decarbonising heavy industries.
Similarly, we have recently successfully delivered the Power Station 5 Block 4 gas turbine combined cycle (GTCC) power plant project at Aluminium Bahrain (Alba), with our partners, which is powered by our state-of-the-art, hydrogen-ready M701JAC gas and steam turbines.
For utility power plants, we are supplying our hydrogen-ready gas turbines to the new Rumah-1 and Al-Nairyah-1 power plants in Saudi Arabia, which will deliver an added 3.6 GW to the Saudi grid, roughly 2.5 percent of the country's grid capacity.
In Morocco, we are supplying two hydrogen-ready M701JAC gas turbines for the Al Wahda Open Cycle Gas Turbine Power Plant, which is owned and operated by The National Office of Electricity and Drinking Water (ONEE). This peaker power plant will complement the country's growing renewable energy resources by offering rapid response to grid fluctuations and ensuring a stable and reliable power supply.
These real-world projects are underpinned by our global R&D efforts. In Japan, we have established the Takasago Hydrogen Park, the world's first integrated validation facility for hydrogen-based power solutions. It is where we test hydrogen combustion, storage, and supply chain technologies in real-world conditions, and the learnings there are already informing our projects in the Middle East.
Are there any pilot projects or strategic partnerships underway in the hydrogen value chain that you see as transformative for the region?
Across the Middle East, Mitsubishi Power is actively collaborating with governments, national utilities, and private sector leaders to turn hydrogen ambitions into reality through tangible, on-the-ground initiatives.
Take Egypt, for example, where hydrogen is being introduced in the industrial sector. We are working with the Alexandria National Refining and Petrochemicals Company (ANRPC) to integrate hydrogen combustion at its refinery to support the partial replacement of natural gas with hydrogen in its fired heaters. We are preparing to convert a 100-tonne-per-hour industrial boiler to run on 100 percent hydrogen. This is the first project of its kind in the MENA region, and a global reference for industrial hydrogen combustion.
These projects are real-world examples of how hydrogen can shape a cleaner and more reliable energy future for the region.
How do you assess the scalability and near-term commercial viability of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies within your portfolio?
While clean fuels such as hydrogen can help us cut emissions at the source, there is still an important role for carbon capture, utilisation, and storage (CCUS) solutions.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, our parent company, is a global leader with over 70 percent of the market. These decades of successful experience across the entire CO2 value chain give us strong confidence in the scalability and commercial viability of CCUS solutions.
In the Middle East, we are actively exploring how these solutions can be applied to key industrial sectors. In Bahrain, for instance, we are conducting a feasibility study with Alba to implement CO2 capture technologies at their smelting plant, which could become the first of its kind in the aluminium sector.
At Mitsubishi Power, we are committed to continue advancing CCUS alongside hydrogen and other decarbonisation technologies, to help industries across sectors reduce emissions and transition toward a low-carbon economy.
(Reporting by Anoop Menon; Editing by SA Kader)
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