Global Energy Ventures targets the European green hydrogen market with MoU

Energy transport provider Global Energy Ventures (ASX: GEV) is grabbing a foothold in the growing European green hydrogen market, inking an MoU with German engineering firm ILF.

Amid a growing push from economies in Western Europe to meet their carbon emissions targets over the coming decades, as much as 85 per cent of the world’s proposed green hydrogen projects are in Europe.

The MoU is valid until at least the end of 2022 and would see the German engineers and GEV work in tandem to assess green hydrogen projects in both Europe and GEV’s native Australia using GEV’s proposed fuel cell-powered C-H2 shipping technology.

GEV recently received in principle approval for the compressed hydrogen containment system on its C-H2 vessel design from the American Bureau of Shipping.

The division of labour would see ILF design the upstream infrastructure from the producer to the export or loading facility and downstream from the import or unloading facility to the consumer, while GEV would cover the port-to-port shipment of hydrogen.

Global Energy Ventures share price today:

A greener Europe

According to industry association the Hydrogen Council, total investments in large-scale hydrogen developments will top $US300 billion by 2030.

Members of the group are expecting a six-fold increase in their investments through 2025 and a 16-fold increase by the end of the decade.

Goldman Sachs has delved even further into its crystal ball, predicting the global market for green hydrogen – hydrogen derived from renewable energy sources – could hit $10 trillion by 2050 and supply 25 per cent of the world’s energy needs.

Europe is one of the fastest moving economies in the shift towards green hydrogen generation, with a pipeline of almost 20GW planned to be up and running in Germany, the UK and Netherlands by 2030.

According to its hydrogen strategy the EU wants to establish 40GW of green hydrogen generation in the European hydrogen market by 2030, with the capacity to import another 40GW to satisfy its carbon emissions targets.

“GEV has identified Europe as a key market for the company’s C-H2 shipping and supply chain with the renewable energy sector growing at a rapid rate for some years and the transport of green hydrogen using compression highly suitable given the short to medium distances to future demand centres such as Germany,” GEV managing director Martin Carolan said.

“The MOU with ILF will establish GEV’s launch into Europe with one of the world’s leading engineering firms with expertise in the design and implementation of green hydrogen projects.

“ILF’s experience in hydrogen, strong reputation in project delivery and long-standing relationships will be beneficial to GEV in Europe while we will also look to ILF’s expertise across the value chain for hydrogen projects in Australia.”

The need for solutions to ship hydrogen into Europe was cited by ILF business development manager Jens Kottsieper as one of the reasons the GEV MoU appealed to ILF.

Green hydrogen in sharp focus

News about the growth of the listed green hydrogen space has come thick and fast over the past year as investors have awakened to its emergence as a potential major source of clean energy.

Oil and gas explorer Prominence Energy (ASX: PRM) was another listed smallcap to bring out a hydrogen announcement this morning.

It announced a raising $3.2 million capital raising, part of which will be used to acquire 20 per cent of Patriot Hydrogen, a company aiming to produce compressed hydrogen gas and biochar from a biomass to hydrogen plant in Port Anthony, Victoria, by early 2022.