Energy. Germany joins Portugal, Spain and France in H2MED hydrogen bonds
Germany will join the project for new connections for the transport of hydrogen known as H2MED agreed between Portugal, Spain and France last October, the governments of the countries involved announced this Sunday.
“We decided to expand H2MED, which thanks to European funds unites [quando estiver concretizado] Portugal, Spain and France, to Germany, which will be a partner in the infrastructure of this project”, said the French president, Emmanuel Macron, at the end of the Franco-German summit that took place in Paris.
Macron added that there is “a will” to promote green hydrogen at European level.
Also the Spanish government, in a communiqué, announced the agreement for “Germany to join H2MED”.
This is the “reinforcement of the pan-European dimension of H2MED”, which “for the first time in history” could make the Iberian Peninsula a “leading hub of green energy for the whole of Europe”, defends the Spanish government, in the same communicator.
“The agreement arrives after taking place between the governors of the four countries, favored by their deeply Europeanist vision”, says the Government of Madrid.
In October, Portugal and Spain reached an agreement with France to build new connections to transport green hydrogen, one between Celorico da Beira and Zamora (CelZa) and another between Barcelona and Marseille (BarMar), in a project named H2MED.
Last August, the German Prime Minister, Olaf Scholz, had defended the construction of a pan-European ‘pipeline’, from Portugal to Germany, to reduce the continent’s dependence on Russian gas and to diversify energy sources.
The new connections to transport energy between Portugal, Spain and France, known as the “Green Energy Corridor”, exclude gas and will be for hydrogen only, and should be operational in 2030.
The three governments adopted the project to European funds in December.
European funding for H2MED could reach 50% of the estimated cost of the project, which Portugal, Spain and France estimate to be 350 million euros in the case of CelZa and 2,500 million in BarMar, according to a document released in early December, in Alicante, Spain, after a meeting of the Prime Ministers of Portugal and Spain, António Costa and Pedro Sánchez, and of Macron, which was also attended by the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
The H2MED will have the capacity to transport 2 million tonnes of green hydrogen per year between Barcelona and Marseille and 750 thousand tonnes between Celorico da Beira and Zamora.
These correspond to 10% of the estimated consumption of green hydrogen (H2) across the European Union in 2030, which would make this project the first major European corridor for this energy.
The European Union has set this year as a target for 2030, to reduce the use of gas, the consumption of 20 million tons of green hydrogen per year, of which 10 million must be produced within the European space and 10 million imported.
Green hydrogen is produced from renewable energies such as solar or wind.
In December, in Alicante, the president of the European Commission welcomed the agreement between Portugal, Spain and France, which he said was in line with Brussels’ strategy.
The project “will require, on the part of Portugal (…), reconversions of the gas network to bring hydrogen from the production areas to Celorico da Beira and, in turn, to Spain”, he said at the time, in Alicante, the Portuguese Environment Minister, Duarte Cordeiro.
At stake are the gas connections between Figueira da Foz and Celorico da Beira and from Monforte to Celorico da Beira, the first of which currently has a “more advanced production potential” and can attract “new green hydrogen projects ” in addition to those already identified there, according to Duarte Cordeiro, who estimated the cost of adapting the connection between Figueira da Foz and Celorico da Beira at 120 million euros.