Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) - Low carbon construction plant & hydrogen supply

National Highways is the government company charged with operating, maintaining and improving England's motorways and major A-roads which form the Strategic Road Network (SRN).

Part of these improvements is the Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) Programme, part of the biggest investment in the UK's road network which will provide a new road crossing of the River Thames. Further information on LTC can be found at this link: https://nationalhighways.co.uk/our-roads/lower-thames-crossing/

National Highways' is exploring ways to deliver carbon neutral construction of LTC, with the emphasis on reducing carbon emissions to the lowest level practicable. To illustrate, it is estimated that up to 60 million litres of diesel could be used by non-road mobile machinery (eg. excavators, dump trucks and cranes) and other types of construction equipment.

We invite participation in a market engagement exercise on "Low carbon construction plant and hydrogen supply" in support of LTC.

We are interested in any technology that could deliver zero carbon emissions from construction plant and anticipate that many of these solutions will be procured by the successful tenderers for the three design and build contracts (these contracts delivering twin bored tunnels and the associated link roads north and south of the river, with construction assumed to take place between 2025 and 2031). This includes hydrogen power, which we have identified could be a key technology, particularly for non-road mobile machinery.

We would like to understand the capability and the capacity of the market to support our ambition, as well as the commercial and procurement approaches that could best secure a hydrogen based ecosystem for our construction plant. We are particularly interested in the following scope of supply:

1. Generation and supply of hydrogen 2. Transportation to site of hydrogen 3. Storage and management on, or close to the site, of hydrogen 4. Distribution and refuelling of hydrogen powered plant and equipment on site 5. Hydrogen powered (combustion/fuel cell/other) construction plant 6. Other zero emissions construction plant

The format of the market engagement will be an introductory session led by LTC on 9th September 2022, with the opportunity for interested parties to raise questions, followed by subsequent one-to-one sessions with interested parties.

To register your interest in attending the introductory session, which will be held via MS Teams, please email [email protected] by 5.00pm 7th September 2022.

Following the market engagement exercise, the LTC project team will consider the outcomes. If the decision is to proceed then a procurement strategy will be agreed upon and ratified, and a PCR2015 compliant procedure will be undertaken to appoint suitably qualified supplier(s) for the provision of the identified requirements.

Additional information: A virtual supplier event will be held on Friday 9th September 2022 for those suppliers interested in these potential opportunities.

This will be an online MS Teams call and will provide greater clarity on our requirements. If you are interested in registering for this event please email:

[email protected]

We will then contact you with further details on how to register.

Interested parties will not be prejudiced by any response or failure to respond to this Early Engagement Notice. Nor shall a response to this Early Engagement Notice guarantee an invitation to participate in any future procurement process that National Highways may conduct. This Early Engagement Notice does not constitute a call for competition to procure any works or services and is not published to reduce time limited for the receipt of tenders. National Highways is not bound to accept any proposals offered.

National Highways is not liable for any costs, fees or expenses incurred by any party responding to this Early Engagement Notice or any party who may participate in any future procurement process. In the event that National Highways decides to proceed with any procurement, it is currently assumed that such procurement will be carried out in accordance with the provisions of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 unless any legal requirement requires a different procedure to be adopted.

This Early Engagement Notice does not constitute any commitment by Highways England to undertake any public procurement exercise for Lower Thames Crossing.