The Dutch government has awarded almost €250m ($268m) to seven green hydrogen projects with a combined capacity of 101MW, following a competitive bidding process.
Almost all of this capacity appears to come from two projects: RWE’s 50MW Eemshydrogen facility in Eemshaven and VoltH2’s 50MW plant in Delfzijl.
However, given that the Netherlands Enterprise Agency, which ran the auction, has listed 91MW as based in the northeastern Groningen province (where both Eemshaven and Delfzijl are located), this could suggest that at least one of those two projects has reduced its first phase size since it was originally announced.
Other winners include:
- H2 Hollandia, a 5MW plant in Nieuw-Buinen, which will draw on otherwise-curtailed power from the 115MW Vloeivelden solar park
- Hysolar’s 2.5MW project co-located with a 9MW solar farm in Nieuwegein
- Two projects listed as “Groengas asset”, one in Amsterdam and the other in Groningen
- Refuelling station operator Van Kessel Olie for a project in Oude Tonge
RWE has confirmed that it has received €124.9m for its 50MW project, with a final investment decision due for the end of this year.
The green hydrogen facility, which has already received environmental and building permits, will be built on the same site as the Eemshaven coal- and bionass-fired power plant and the Magnum gas-fired power plant.
However, Eemshydrogen will draw on electricity from the nearby 171MW Westereems onshore wind farm.
While the last turbines for the wind farm had been installed in 2020, RWE plans to bring the electrolyser capacity on line in 2027.
This means that as an “early-mover” project, Eemshydrogen would be allowed to bypass the EU’s additionality rules, which ordinarily require electrolysers to draw power from renewable assets built within three years, and draw on older renewables up until 2038.
“This is excellent news,” said Sopna Sury, chief operating officer, hydrogen, for RWE. “The funding is one crucial component to make the overall project economically viable and advance the ramp-up of the hydrogen market in the province of Groningen and beyond.”
“By supplying clean hydrogen, for example to the transport sector and chemical plants, our Eemshaven site will help reduce carbon emissions of industrial companies in North-Western Europe,” she added.
The Netherlands Enterprise Agency notes that the auction, which aimed to support projects between 500kW and 50MW in size, was extremely competitive, with more than €600m bid for in total.
The largest subsidy by capacity from the seven winners was for €3.2m per megawatt, with the companies now required to commission their electrolysers by 2028.
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