Electrolysis

The renewables-powered sustainable hydrogen announcements have come as a group of international researchers made controversial claims about the potential of gas-fired blue hydrogen to be part of the climate change solution.

A printed circuit board-based hydrogen fuel cell for use in autonomous boats and ships has been engineered by a British consortium, and Italian energy companies Snam and Edison want to set up a 220 MW green hydrogen production plant powered by 380 MW of solar in Apulia.

TotalEnergies wants to decarbonize hydrogen production in Normandy with the support of Air Liquide and, in Chile, an international consortium has begun construction of the country’s first green hydrogen facility. Elsewhere, the Indian government has invited U.S. companies to bid for green hydrogen and electrolyzer contracts.

Enertrage and Sunfire want to build an electrolysis test field in eastern Germany and Hyzon Motors sold 500 hydrogen-powered electric trucks to Shanghai Hydrogen HongYun Automotive. Moreover, several partnership agreements were announced in Malaysia, Japan, the US, Australia and South Korea.

Elsewhere, Uniper and the Port of Rotterdam have signed a deal to produce green hydrogen at the former’s site on the Maasvlakte extension of the port, and the Japanese government is helping Azerbaijan develop a green hydrogen and ammonia market.

A 600 kW, container-based solar array will be used to electrolyze green hydrogen at a mine in Limpopo, South Africa after Engie signed a two-year lease for the mobile system, at Anglo American’s Mogalakwena site.

Moreover, two big Russian corporations have unveiled plans to produce hydrogen and Portuguese utility EDP said it wants to set up a a pilot project for a green hydrogen plant in Brazil.

Norwegian consultancy DNV today published the latest of its annual surveys of the state of the energy transition and lamented the fact so very little has been achieved during the last five years. We are forging ahead into a world that will be 2.3C hotter this century, predicts the report.

H2 Energy Europe is building a power-to-gas project in Denmark and Everfuel wants to put hydrogen refueling stations in Sweden. Chinese energy giant Sinopec said it wants to invest massively in hydrogen and the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has said hydrogen will be the main driver for “very quick” growth in electricity demand.

Conceived by Swiss researchers, the battery shows good stability over 50 cycles, with an average energy efficiency of 68% and a water-splitting voltage efficiency of 64.1%. According to its creators, the device produces pure hydrogen that only needs to be dried and compressed for optimal storage.