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Success stories
Fluor A business inspired towards achieving net-zero ambitions
Helen Kilbride, Process Director
How is Fluor thriving? The world’s appetite for energy is changing and Fluor is meeting those needs with the adoption of a new approach inspired by the global mission to transition to net zero. Leveraging its formidable in-house expertise built up over the course of more than a century, the company is not only on its own journey to carbon neutrality but is also positioning itself as a developer of technological solutions to support energy transition strategies across several sectors. Today, it has several projects and people immersed in sustainability as it seeks to build its knowledge base further. The challenge In business since 1912, Fluor has carved a reputation for itself as a reliable provider of comprehensive engineering, procurement, construction and maintenance services for clients, delivering capital efficiency and project certainty through its highly skilled workforce that today stands at 40,000-strong. Throughout this time, it has ridden many challenges as market fortunes have fluctuated and today’s energy consumers are not only seeking clean and sustainable energy, they are demanding it. A rethink was therefore needed – how could Fluor utilise its technical expertise to support clients on their decarbonization journeys and advance its own sustainability goal.
looking inwardly and outwardly, a new strategy emerged in terms of how to position the business as well as achieve Fluor’s own net-zero targets. In broad terms, the strategic shift entails detailed engineering work in emerging technologies and engaging with clients earlier in their project cycles. This has involved examining and developing Fluor’s own technology and IP, refocusing its people, and collaborating with start-ups, existing and new clients. Fortunately, the appetite and culture for aligning with netzero agendas was already strong. Internal expertise is being championed externally, with public sessions, knowledge building workshops and Q&As all becoming staple events in the Fluor calendar. The firm has established a dedicated Office of Technology which is pushing internal technology development strategies and exploring ways of taking its solutions to new markets. For example, Fluor is home to over 1200 patents, and over 15 licensed technologies. Fluor owns one of the top three proven carbon capture technologies and is helping not just traditional but other industry sectors such as cement and steel production to decarbonise. For Hydrogen, the company is already applying its carbon capture expertise to make the production of blue hydrogen more affordable with a solution that cuts the space and energy required to produce it.
The solution
On the post-combustion side, in May 2020, Fluor was awarded the front-end engineering and design (FEED) for California Resources Corporation (CRC’s) 550 MW natural gas combined cycle power plant, a carbon capture, utilisation and storage retrofit project at the Elk Hills Station in Bakersfield, California.
At the beginning of 2021, after a series of meetings
Collaboration with and learning from external partners,
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EIC Survive and Thrive
2023