German hydrogen project receives € 34 million funding

The Joint hydrogen project ‘Bad Lauchstadt Energy Park’ has received a € 34 million funding decision from the Germany Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi), H2 Bulletin reports.

The project partners seek to investigate the production, storage, transport, and economic use of green hydrogen under real conditions on an industrial scale. The project waited for the long-awaited decision since the BMWi declared the project to be a real laboratory worthy of funding as part of the two-stage application process as early as 2019.

With the funding decision has now received, the construction and development of the first project components starting in fall 2021.

The project consortium consists of:

• Gastechnologisches Institut gGmbH Freiberg (DBI)
• Ontras Gastransport GmbH (Ontras)
• Terrawatt Planungsgesellschaft mbH
• Uniper
• VNG AG.
• VNG Gasspeicher GmbH (VGS)

The main goal of the six participating consortium partners is to make Central Germany into a hydrogen model region. They aim to map the entire value chain for green hydrogen in southern Saxony-Anhalt. Renewable power from a new wind farm will be built to supply power to produce hydrogen through a large-scale electrolysis plant with a capacity of around 30 MW and supplied to the chemical industry in neighbouring Leuna via a 20 km pipeline to be redirected by Ontras.

The development of the energy park is planned in two phases and will be implemented independently.

At the first phase, this autumn, the approved funding will be used to develop further and test hydrogen production and hydrogen transport as well as central components of hydrogen storage as a ‘real laboratory of the energy transition’. The latter include, for example, efficient gas purification and safety technology.

In the second stage, which is not part of the current research project, the salt cavern planned for hydrogen storage, almost 180 meters high, is to be completed and integrated into the value chain from 2026. The project has a total investment volume of around €140 million.

In the future, the energy park can also be integrated into the emerging European hydrogen infrastructure via other eastern German hydrogen projects.