Hydrogen boost from North German, Danish plans for 850 MW electrolyzers by 2025

Five north German states have joined forces to establish a green hydrogen cluster with an interim, 500-MW electrolyzer target set for 2025, the HY-5 initiative said at the Hamburg wind fair Dec. 1.

At the same event, the Green Hydrogen Hub Denmark (GHH) project unveiled plans for a 350-MW electrolyzer project in Northern Jytland by 2025.

HY-5 comprises the German coastal states of Lower Saxony, Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Western-Pomerania, Hamburg and Bremen.

Around 50 green hydrogen projects are already planned across the region, including by Orsted, EDF, refinery Heide, ArcelorMittal, BP and RWE. In addition six regulatory sandboxes are being funded by the federal government.

"HY-5 bundles our forces and we are demonstrating the enormous potential of hydrogen technology in our region," Schleswig-Holstein economy minister Bernd Bucholz said.

The region is home to 15 million people with a notional GDP making it seventh in the EU country rankings, larger than Denmark and the Netherlands together, HY-5 said.

Meanwhile the GHH project in Denmark said it aims to be the "first fully commercially viable, 100% green, large-scale hydrogen production, storage and CAES [compressed air energy storage] solution."

Gas Storage Denmark (part of state-owned system operator Energinet), Eurowind Energy and Corre Energy plan to establish a hydrogen production and storage hub close to the power grid, the gas network and underground gas storage and wind resources.

Denmark's energy minister Dan Jorgensen said his country's decarbonization targets including plans for the world's first energy island off the Jytland coast in the North Sea with the energy ministry announcing further support for power-to-X technologies.

The regional initiatives follow a hydrogen roadmap published Nov. 9 by Germany's North-Rhine Westphalia state targeting 3 GW of electrolyzer capacity by 2030 with Eur4-billion ($4.8 billion) investment to help decarbonize Germany's industrial heartland.

The Northern Dutch region around Groningen province across the border on Oct. 30 presented a scaled-up, Eur9billion hydrogen plan to 2030 with the 'Partners in the Investment Plan Hydrogen Northern Netherlands' including RWE, Vattenfall, Engie, Shell, Equinor, Gasunie and Nouryon, ready to jointly develop more than 50 projects spanning production, transmission, storage and end use of hydrogen.

The initiatives in addition to national strategies underline the fundamental impact hydrogen can have on decarbonization as well as energy system integration of wind rich region such as the Dutch, German, Danish coastal regions helping to keep power grid infrastructure investment at bay, while allowing for more wind turbines to be installed both on- and offshore.

The three countries are aiming for a combined 40 GW offshore wind capacity by 2030 as well as even higher onshore wind capacity with wind additions in Germany's coastal regions currently restricted by the so-called grid saturation zone.