The Erlangen-based company Hydrogenious LOHC is investigating the use of the chemical hydrogen carrier benzyltoluene for industrial customers in the Danube region. The "Green Hydrogen@Blue Danube" project has now been recognized by the European Commission as an IPCEI project.
As part of the project, Hydrogenious LOHC is installing a new "ReleasePLANT" that can release hydrogen from its LOHC carrier. Its capacity will be 1,000 - 2,000 tons of green hydrogen per year. The plant is being built in Bavaria and "near the Danube". Here, hydrogen produced in Austria and later in south-eastern Europe will be released from the LOHC transport medium and made available to regional industry.
Green Hydrogen@Blue Danube is one of the 33 projects of the IPCEI wave "Hy2Infra", which follows the IPCEI waves "Hy2Tech" and "Hy2Use" in 2022. Following last week's state aid approval, it is one of 24 German projects to receive state and private funding.
The German government and the federal states plan to invest a total of around €4.6 billion in the hydrogen infrastructure projects in Germany that are part of Hy2Infra. According to Hydrogenious, the companies involved intend to contribute a further €3.4 billion, which would bring the total investment in Germany to around €8 billion.
From south-eastern Europe to Bavaria: hydrogen transportation via LOHC
Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Robert Habeck declared on Thursday (February 15) that the Hy2Infra projects are "important building blocks for the hydrogen ramp-up in Germany and Europe." On the German side, projects such as GreenHydrogen@Blue Danube also represent a "central element for the hydrogen core network": "Together with the companies and the federal states, we can now move quickly into implementation."
The project consortium founded in 2020 - in addition to Hydrogenious LOHC, the Austrian company Verbund AG, Bayernoil, Bosch, MAN Energy Solutions and Clariant are also involved - aims to establish "a European value chain for green hydrogen", covering production, transportation using LOHC and applications in the industrial and mobility sectors. In the first phase, the focus will be on the production and use of hydrogen in Austria and Bavaria.
In the second phase, production capacities are to be successively added in south-eastern Europe. The hydrogen could then be transported along the European transport corridor (TEN-T) Danube to customers in Austria and Germany. Hydrogenious describes the project as an "important milestone" in the company's history. With Green Hydrogen@BlueDanube, the company can show that LOHC enables safe and efficient hydrogen supply chains. It could therefore play a key role in the European hydrogen ramp-up.
