Building on the experiences of HyER, the European Association of Hydrogen, fuel cells and Electro-mobility in European Regions, that the EHA set up and coordinated from 2008 till 2015, the former Joint Undertaking for Fuels Cells and Hydrogen, now Clean Hydrogen Partnership (CHP), together with a team of consultants, fostered the concept of “Hydrogen Valley”, to develop the first hydrogen communities around the production, distribution and use of hydrogen.
In 2017, the FCH 2 JU (the organisation preceding the CHP) initiated the FCH regions initiative and launched the “Project Development Assistance (PDA) for regions and cities” project, that supported 11 regions in detailed project planning and development, between 2020 and 2021. The first CHP-funded Hydrogen Valley is situated in the Northern Netherlands, the HEAVENN project, that took up the lessons learned of the first EU Synergy Project between energy and transport networks, TSO2020, developed and supported by the EHA, that finished in 2021.
As a result of the success of the Project Development Assistance (PDA) for regions and cities project in 2020-21, and supported by the recent REPowerEU plan, that seeks to double the number of Hydrogen Valleys in 2030, the CHP announced on January 31, 2023 the started of grant preparations of a further 9 regions for a total funding of 105.4 mln Euro. The 9 regions cover 2 flagship Hydrogen Valleys (projects – producing at least 5,000 H2 tonnes / year). The first will be comprising Croatia, the Autonomous Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia in Italy, and Slovenia and the second aims to build a hydrogen corridor, including Estonia and South Finland. In additionvgrant preparations have started 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 include regions in Bulgaria (Stara Zagora), Greece (Crete and Corinthia), Ireland (Galway), Italy (Lombardy), Turkey (South Marmara) and Luxembourg.
Further to these regions, the CHP launched a call for more applications last September 2022 and published the 15 winners on January 15, 2023; the regions are from a total of ten different countries (EU Cohesion Countries, European islands and Outermost Regions) and have been selected following a two-stage application and evaluation process. The selected regions will now receive targeted support from dedicated hydrogen consultants, beginning in early 2023.
More information can be found at the initiative website: https://www.h2regions.eu/
The full list of selected regions is below:
Estonia
France
Greece
Ireland
Latvia
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Slovakia
Slovenia
The CTC Network promotes the accelerated transfer of environmentally sound technologies for low carbon and climate resilient development at the request of developing countries.
