French ambassador visits HyNetherlands project in Eemshaven
French ambassador Luis Vassy was certainly impressed by the ambitions expressed by ENGIE and partners in the HyNetherlands project. Mr. Vassy visited the ENGIE Eemscentrale in Eemshaven on the 7th of June. This visit was part of the ambassador’s visit to the North of the country, which focused on the energy transition and hydrogen.
The French ambassador visited ENGIE and New Energy Coalition, among others. New Energy Coalition is a network of knowledge institutions, companies, governments and NGOs that work together to accelerate the energy transition for a sustainable future, whom which ENGIE works closely.
At ENGIE’s Eems power plant, Grégory Bartholomé, project leader of HyNetherlands, took the ambassador along in the plans and updated him about the unique partnership started earlier this year with OCI and EEW to realize a large-scale hydrogen-based value chain. The ambassador and ENGIE colleagues also exchanged views on project optimization and possible synergies with French activities. HyNetherlands aims to develop, build and operate one of the first large-scale industrial value chains in Europe. The production of sustainable hydrogen, which is intended to take place at the ENGIE location in Eemshaven, will be used in combination with biogenic CO₂ (from EEW’s waste-to-power plant) for the production of e-methanol by OCI. To learn more about this partnership, go to the project page.
A time capsule at the place where it should happen
At first sight it looks like an ordinary lawn next to the power plant, but an electrolyser will be built on this lawn in the coming years for the production of hydrogen. Symbolically, the ambassador and project leader Grégory put a shovel in the ground and a time capsule containing a good bottle of champagne was prepared. Together with an infographic showing the plans of the project and personal notes from the team members, the pipe will be stored at the intended location of the project. Champagne usually has an expiration date of about 9 months, but more important than the shelf life of the champagne is the news whether we will receive positive feedback from the Innovation Fund, the IPCEI and the Breakthrough Energy Catalyst Fund in Autumn this year. It has been agreed with the French ambassador that he will visit us again when we can toast to this.
We thank Mr. Vassy for his visit and interest and hope to be able to give a positive follow-up to this.
On the left project leader Grégory Bartholomé, on the right French ambassador Mr. Luis Vassy