A green hydrogen project in northern Germany intended to install 500MW of electrolysers by 2030 has been cancelled for a second time, with partners reportedly citing a lack of planning certainty.
According to local news, the HyScale 100 in Schleswig-Holstein had been in line for almost €900m ($1.04bn) in federal and state funding and could have scaled to a capacity of 2.1GW to decarbonise petrochemical and cement applications.
The project consortium featuring Raffinerie Heide, Danish energy company Ørsted, Swiss construction firm Holcim, and EDF’s hydrogen-focused branch Hynamics has pulled the plug despite being allocated €194m ($224m) in state funding in April 2022.
Also a recognised European Project of Common Interest, H2 View understands the facility would have received EU financial support, comprising a portion of the €900m investment.
A spokesperson from Schleswig-Holstein’s Ministry for Energy Transition said the project had not cost the state any money, according to German news outlet NDR.
Had it been developed, the project would have combined green hydrogen with carbon dioxide captured from a nearby cement facility to generate e-methanol to supply an olefin plant at the site.
The HyScale development was a reimagined version of Raffinerie Heide, Ørsted and Hynamics’ Westküste 100 project, which was cancelled in 2023.
At the time, the trio cited high costs, despite having been awarded €30m ($34.6m) in funding from the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWE) in 2020.
Shifting policy and high costs continue to beset the European hydrogen sector, with uncertainty plaguing the development of capital-intensive large-scale facilities integrating new technologies.
In April, Swedish firm Stegra, formerly H2 Green Steel, took on a$1.4bn rescue package to complete its 700MW green steel plant in Boden after exhausting funds.
The news broke just days after Raffinerie Heide’s owner Klesch Group, completed the acquisition of the Gelsemkirchen refinery from British oil firm BP in an unvalued deal.
Klesch said the deal marked an “important milestone” in the “continued expansion” of its refining portfolio.
In October 2024, Danish wind developer Ørsted also announced it would back out of two green hydrogen projects in a pivot away from green fuels, following its scrapping of the Swedish 55,000-tonne FlagshipOne e-fuel plant just months earlier.
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