Source: Energy & Management Powernews, October 05, 2022
The energy ministers of Germany and the Netherlands want to cooperate for renewable electricity and the production of hydrogen. German ministries want to promote green chemistry.
Cooperations were agreed at the meeting of the German-Dutch climate cabinet on October 4. On this occasion, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection (BMWK) presented the new funding call "Electrochemical Materials and Processes for Green Hydrogen and Green Chemistry" (ECCM).
In this call, together with the Dutch Research Council, they call for proposals for research projects in the field of electrochemical materials and processes for hydrogen and chemistry from renewable sources. To this end, the ramp-up of the hydrogen economy is to be accelerated, said German Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens): "Particularly in industry, the demand for green hydrogen will quickly become very high."
Hydrogen for climate-friendly industry
Germany has set itself the goal of becoming a global leader in technologies for hydrogen production, storage, use and transport, he said. Germany needs partners like the Netherlands that can import green hydrogen and its follow-on projects from regions of the world with a high supply of renewable energy, Habeck further explained, "By combining national strengths, synergies can be exploited and significant progress can be made in building global supply chains for green hydrogen."
His Dutch counterpart Rob Jetten added, "Germany and the Netherlands recognize the historic opportunity to accelerate the provision of renewable offshore energy." Together with Denmark and Belgium, the two countries have already put forward plans to supply more than 200 million European households with green energy from the North Sea by 2050, he said. "We also need green molecules to make our industries more sustainable," Jetten said. Therefore, he said, they will join forces to expand the production of green hydrogen and build the necessary infrastructure.
Call for funding for cross-border projects
Federal Research Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger (FDP) said, "The joint call for funding and the associated projects are an important building block for the development of innovative technologies for green hydrogen and green chemistry." In order to become independent of Russian gas and at the same time tackle climate change, ten million euros would be invested in new projects with the new program, she added. "Germany and the Netherlands together form a strong industrial cluster," she said. "My goal is to make Germany a hydrogen republic," she said. To achieve this, she said, strong research and a rapid transfer of results into applications are necessary.
The project ideas should involve partners along the entire innovation chain, from research to industry to end users. The topics on which researchers can submit designs are production of hydrogen by electrolysis, storage of hydrogen, P2X technologies and downstream processes for the production of energy carriers and "green" chemicals, electro-synthesis and electrochemical conversion, material and process technology for the above processes, design and manufacturing processes for green hydrogen technologies, and system design and system integration.
Only projects that are assessed as worthy of funding and highly promising on the German and Dutch side can be funded. They must have a provable added value compared to purely national projects and strengthen the cooperation of the partners. The projects will be monitored by the project management organizations in the Netherlands (NWO) and Germany (PtJ). Funding of five million euros each will be made available on the German and Dutch sides, with which five to 15 collaborative projects are expected to be initiated.
Further information on the ECCM program is available on the Internet.
Author: Susanne Harmsen
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