Ørsted to Develop One of the World's Largest Renewable Hydrogen Plants to Be Linked to Industrial Demand in the Netherlands and Belgium
Originally published on Ørsted site 3/31/2021
'SeaH2Land' is an ambitious vision, linking GW-scale electrolysis to the large industrial demand in the Dutch-Flemish North Sea Port cluster through an envisaged regional cross-border pipeline. The green electricity required to produce the renewable hydrogen is proposed to come from the build-out of additional large-scale offshore wind. The major industrial companies in the region ArcelorMittal, Yara, Dow Benelux, and Zeeland Refinery, support the development of the required regional infrastructure to enable sustainably-produced steel, ammonia, ethylene, and fuels in the future, helping the Netherlands and Belgium to accelerate their carbon reductions towards 2030 and beyond.
GW-scale electrolysis and large industrial demand
The SeaH2Land vision includes a renewable hydrogen production facility of 1 GW by 2030 to be developed by Ørsted. If realised, the electrolyser, which will produce the renewable hydrogen, can convert about 20% of the current hydrogen consumption in the region to renewable hydrogen.
With 580,000 tonnes per year, the North Sea Port cluster is one of the largest production and demand centres of fossil hydrogen in Europe today. Driven by decarbonisation efforts, industrial demand in the cluster could grow to about 1,000,000 tonnes by 2050, equivalent to roughly 10 GW of electrolysis.
GW electrolyser directly linked to new 2 GW offshore wind farm
Ørsted proposes to connect the GW electrolyser directly to a new 2 GW offshore wind farm in the Dutch North Sea. This will enable the large-scale supply of renewable electricity required for production of renewable hydrogen and fits well with the ambitions of the Dutch authorities for an accelerated offshore wind roll-out in line with increasing electricity demand. The offshore wind farm could be built in one of the zones in the southern part of the Dutch exclusive economic zone that has already been designated for offshore wind development.
