NeoGreen Portugal invests EUR 1 billion for a Green Hydrogen production plant in the Sines Hydrogen Valley. This investment that is formalized on the 14th of November is one of a pipeline of investment projects that total EUR 20 billion by 2030. These projects include EUR 2.500 in land and sea logistics, EUR 12.500 in industrial circular projects for decarbonization and EUR 5.000 M in telecommunications, submarine cable stations and data centers.
According to Crunchbase, NeoGreen Hydrogen has obtained seed funding amounting to $ 232.1K on the 4th of October 2021 and according to PitchBook, the latest deal amounts to $ 1.2 M. The company, based in Canada, is a Green Hydrogen developer focusing on emerging markets, with the goal of generating electricity from Green Hydrogen and Green Ammonia to store and distribute it.
NeoGreen Portugal is a joint venture between NeoGreen Hydrogen Corp and Frequent Summer S.A. (Portugal), that develops photovoltaic parks. The investment contract is to reserve the rights to an area of 10.5 hectares in the Sines Logistics Industrial Zone (ZILS) to invest over EUR 1 billion in a Green Hydrogen production plant.
The Green Hydrogen plant will consist of an electrolyzer with a capacity of 500MW that will produce Green Hydrogen as well as fuel by-products. This project is in line with Portugal’s strategy for the Sines Hydrogen Valley towards the energy and digital transition. Sines is consolidating is position and attracting major investments in the fields of Logistics, Industry, Energy and Telecommunications from a number of countries including Spain, France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Netherlands, Denmark, UK, China, Australia, Brazil, the US and Canada.
Sines in Portugal is strategically positioned within the EU to become one of the top Green Hydrogen Valleys (H2Vs) globally. The Sines Hydrogen Valley is Portugal’s largest development area, with 2.375 hectares dedicated to different sectors including energy. Energia Sul brings together energy industries, refineries, petrochemicals and chemicals but with the focus on renewable energy.
Portugal is concerned about climate change and focuses on energy transition in line with the EUs ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2035. This is enabled by the EU’s Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) that provides grants and loans to support reforms and investments in the EU Member States at a total value of €723.8 billion.
Under this Facility, Horizon Europe is the EU’s key funding programme for research and innovation with a budget of €95.5 billion, that allows countries to tackle climate change for sustainable development. The transition towards climate neutrality by 2050 gives energy a central role, as energy is today responsible for more than 75% of the EU’s greenhouse gas emissions.
REPowerEU will speed up this transition and move towards renewable energy sources and Green Hydrogen. This will make Europe more resilient and independent while providing sustainable and affordable energy. The emphasis is on innovation for finding novel and disruptive renewable energy technologies and energy storage solutions.
As Green Hydrogen will play a key role for long-term energy storage and for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, REPowerEU provides for the implementation of a Hydrogen Accelerator for renewable hydrogen.
The EU is funding a total of EUR 5.2 billion for hydrogen projects including infrastructure in Portugal and in 12 other EU countries. This is part of the EU rules on state aid for projects of common interest within the EU such as the construction of infrastructure in the hydrogen value chain. The IPCEI Hy2Use project involves Portugal, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Slovakia, Spain, Finland, France, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Poland and Sweden.
Portugal’s involvement includes the construction of infrastructure for hydrogen, which will be the responsibility of the Portuguese group in the chemical industry sector Bondalti, according to the European Commission.
Portugal is expected to achieve carbon neutrality by 2045 through investments in public transport and hydrogen. The government is enacting a new Climate Act and has also managed to close down its coal-fired power stations.
The Portuguese government has also defined its national strategy for hydrogen for industrial use, as the country is currently dependent on natural gas. Moreover, the government is planning to export Green Energy and this is in line with the recent agreement with Spain and France for the creation of a “green corridor” that will enable exports to the EU. Counting only the Iberian market, this represents 60 million people.
In addition, Portugal plans to reduce its dependency on the volatility of global markets in relation to gas. Prime Minister António Costa has stated that the reason for the current low electricity prices in Portugal is because 60% of the energy currently consumed comes from renewables. He also added that Portugal’s goal is to have 80% of the energy consumed being based on renewables by 2026. The Iberian solution, which avoids excessive contamination of the price of electricity by the price of gas, works well since a high percentage of the energy produced comes from renewable sources.
According to Statista, the primary source of renewable energy to produce green hydrogen is solar photovoltaic. Portugal has 28 green hydrogen production facilities and ranks number 8 globally. In 2020, the levelized cost of hydrogen from utility-scale solar PV in Europe was the lowest on the Iberian Peninsula. The lowest levelized costs for producing green hydrogen are possible due to the abundance of solar and wind resources. Sunny Portugal has a bright future for its Green Hydrogen Valley.