The winner of the European Hydrogen Bank competition withdraws application – Argus

The winner of the largest subsidy competition from the European Hydrogen Bank will not use the funding, reports Argus Media, citing one of the project developers.

The reason is that the project will not meet the deadlines set by the EU.

Earlier this year, Swedish utility company Vattenfall and the Danish investment fund Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) won €246.6 million in the second round of Hydrogen Bank funding with a 500 MW electrolysis project in the Netherlands.

The project is being developed by the joint venture Zeevonk. Zeevonk was selected to receive subsidies as the last of 12 initiatives in the general round, which does not specify a particular offtake sector.

However, as Vattenfall noted, they were forced to decide to withdraw their application, taking into account the requirement that projects must be operational and have a viable consumption market by 2030. Meeting this deadline would be impossible due to delays in the construction of hydrogen pipelines planned under the Delta Rhine Corridor (DRC) initiative-implementation has been postponed from 2028 to 2032.

Since the proposed electrolyzer depends on the DRC for hydrogen transportation, the developers have postponed its planned commissioning from 2030 to 2032. The Dutch government, for its part, has made changes to the permit for the electrolyzer and the offshore wind farm that is intended to supply it with power, in response to these delays.

For reference, in June, German energy company LEAG-the country’s second-largest electricity supplier-indefinitely suspended a 110 MW hydrogen energy project in the state of Saxony. The construction of H2UB Boxberg was postponed due to political and economic conditions. The initiative involved creating a large-scale, “green”, energy-efficient storage facility as well as a center for hydrogen production and its use at the sites of decommissioned lignite-fired power plants.