The Clean Hydrogen JU is planning to launch a tender to set-up and run a ‘Hydrogen Valleys Facility’ aiming at accelerating the number of hydrogen valleys in Europe, the company reported on Ted portal.
The facility will include project development assistance to support Hydrogen Valleys at different level of maturity. Whilst the focus will be on European countries, such project development assistance may be extended to third countries, in line with the Commission policy priorities. In addition, it will include activities aiming to ensure that the knowledge gathered and the lessons learnt from Hydrogen Valley projects (including skills) are retained, collected, analysed and widely disseminated and used in a structured and efficient way. The Facility will also be used to maintain and update the Mission Innovation Hydrogen Valley Platform.Estimated value excluding VAT: 12 500 000,00 EUR
The Clean Hydrogen Partnership has already selected 9 Hydrogen Valley projects following its first call proposals (2022). The total funding requested for the 9 Hydrogen Valleys amounts to EUR 105.4 million.
The Clean Hydrogen Partnership has started the grant preparations for 2 flagship Hydrogen Valleys (projects of a scale significantly larger to what has been supported to date – i.e., producing at least 5,000 H2 tonnes / year, with interlinkages to other places of hydrogen production and/or consumptions outside project boundaries), the company stated earlier. The first will be spread across the North Adriatic area (comprising Croatia, the Autonomous Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia in Italy, and Slovenia) and the second aims to build a hydrogen corridor across Baltic Sea countries, including Estonia and South Finland.
Stephen Taylor, Director of Research and Innovation at Area Science Park and Coordinator of the Project Proposal Team of the Joint Working Group for the North Adriatic Hydrogen Valley” said: “The governments of the Republic of Croatia, the Republic of Slovenia and the Autonomous Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia in Italy, together with lead partner HSE and the entire partnership warmly welcome the selection by the Clean Hydrogen Partnership of the North Adriatic Hydrogen Valley project, a flagship initiative in Central-Southern Europe which will facilitate the transition towards an integrated ecosystem involving industry, energy and transport sectors, and enhance cooperation in research and innovation, to develop a hydrogen supply chain. We are looking forward to starting the negotiations for the EU grant agreement and we hope to kickstart this exciting and important project as soon as possible”.
The partnership, led by main Slovenian electricity producer HSE, supported by ECUBES, includes 34 organisations from Government, Research, and Industry, and covers the entire value chain from production through storage and distribution to final end use of hydrogen as a key energy vector in multiple sectors. The amount of financing requested through the Clean Hydrogen Partnership is EUR 25 m.
The other transnational hydrogen valley gathers 44 organisations from regions around the Baltic Sea. The amount of financing requested through the Clean Hydrogen Partnership is EUR 25 million.
In addition, the Clean Hydrogen Partnership has started the grant preparations for 7 smaller scale Hydrogen Valleys projects (at least 500 H2 tonnes / year), focusing on areas of Europe with no or limited presence of H2 Valleys. Each of them will be funded with 8m EUR. The valleys will comprise regions in Bulgaria (Stara Zagora), Greece (Crete and Corinthia), Ireland (Galway), Italy (Lombardy), Turkey (South Marmara) and Luxembourg.
Document on Ted: https://shorturl.at/RKitD
