For its commitment to the CO2-free production and sale of green hydrogen, the German-Norwegian companies Hy2Gen AG and Norsk AS were honoured with the 2018 f-cell award.
A decisive step on the path to a hydrogen economy is the production and sale of green hydrogen. As the world’s sixth largest producer of hydropower, Norway enjoys far-reaching capacities for CO2-free production of hydrogen from renewable energies. This is the approach taken by the German-Norwegian pair Hy2gen AG and Norsk H2, headquartered in Holzgerlingen and Suldal (Norway) respectively. The companies rely on electrolysis, i.e. the CO2-free splitting of water into its constituent components: hydrogen and oxygen, in industrial electrolysers. “In Jelsa, Norway we are currently building the first production halls for CO2-free hydrogen. We use regionally generated electricity from hydropower. In this way electricity generation and electrolysis are completely CO2-free. We can build successively on the capacities in a modular way, so that we are able to deliver over the long term and on an industrial scale following the production start in 2020,” says Sebastian Wider, Chief Technology Officer at Hy2gen AG.
In 2020, Norsk H2 AS will start the production of green hydrogen for commercial use in Jelsa. The successive expansion of the plant will reach an electrolysis capacity of 70 megawatts by 2023. Further locations for the regenerative production of hydrogen will be developed under the leadership of Hy2gen AG in Canada, Southern France and Georgia.
Acclaim for DLR cooperation project with NEL ASA
The German-Norwegian cooperation project of the German Aerospace Center (DLR), Institute of Thermodynamics, NEL ASA and Helmbold-Messtechnik für Brennstoffzellen were acknowledged for their development project “Segmented bipolar plates for alkaline water electrolysis. The aim of the project is to bring the proven measuring methodology up to technical operability, including under the particularly high technical requirements of alkaline electrolysis. The stack designs and operating control of alkaline electrolysers can be improved on the basis of the new data. Above all a more flexible power conducting will be possible in the future – a critical foundation for the incorporation of electrolysers in smart grid applications. The new diagnostic method was developed by the Institute of Thermodynamics of DLR Stuttgart with Norwegian NEL Hydrogen ASA (Oslo) and Baden-Württemberg company Helmbold-Messtechnik für Brennstoffzellen. The prototype is currently being tested in Notodden, Norway.
F-cell award
The f-cell award is endowed by the state of Baden-Württemberg. The competition tenderee is the Ministry of the Environment, Climate and Energy, Baden-Württemberg. 2018 marked the year the f-cell award was bestowed for the 18th time. As a once-off, only cooperation projects and concept ideas between Baden-Württemberg and Norway were allowed to be submitted.
Jury members 2018
Dr. Klaus Bonhoff (NOW GmbH, National Organisation Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technology, Berlin), Gerda Geyer (Innovation Norway), Thomas Gschwind (Ministry of the Environment, Climate and Energy, Baden-Württemberg), Dr. Manuel Schaloske (e-mobil BW), Prof. Dr. Birgit Scheppat (Rhein-Main University of Applied Sciences), Kristian Vik (Norwegian Hydrogen Forum)