A few days after the launch of the first pilot auction of the European Hydrogen Bank, which will take place on 23 November to allocate public incentives for the production of green hydrogen amounting to EUR 800 million, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen – speaking at the opening of the European Hydrogen Week 2023 (an event organised in Brussels by Hydrogen Europe and Hydrogen Europe Research, of which HydroNews is media partner) – revealed what the next steps will be to implement this system of support for the H2 supply chain.
“Today I can announce,” von der Leyen said in a video message, “that in spring 2024 we will launch the second round of auctions of the European Hydrogen Bank, to allocate resources that in total will amount to EUR 3 billion. This shows that the second auction will have a resource allocation of EUR 2.2 billion, additional to the EUR 800 million of the first pilot auction.
She then recalled the other interventions carried out in recent years by the European Union to support the development of the H2 value chain: “We have invested in hydrogen valleys, hydrogen trains and green steel mills, authorising dedicated state aid of more than EUR 17 billion to support 80 projects across the Union.
But that is not all: in the Commission’s view, it is also essential to support the production of green hydrogen outside the EU, in areas where conditions are more favourable for generating H2 at competitive costs to be imported into the Old Continent.
“We have already partnered with Egypt, Kenya, Namibia, and some Latin American countries, while discussions are ongoing with Kazakhstan, Australia, and Oman. Furthermore, they can announce the European Union’s support,” von der Leyen added, ‘for a large project called Green Energy Park, which envisages the construction in Brazil, in the state of Piaui, of a 10 GW plant for the production of green hydrogen and ammonia that will be shipped by sea to the island of Krk, in Croatia, from where the energy vector will then be distributed throughout Southern Europe.
