The project, currently in the development stage, plans to start generating green hydrogen by the end of 2024.
It involves the construction of a 25MW electrolyser on the land plots adjacent to the Sangüesa biomass plant. The electrolyser will be powered by hybrid renewable energy produced at a photovoltaic plant (25MW) and a wind farm (24MW), both newly built facilities that are currently under development.
Once built, the plant will reach a total production of 3,880 tonnes of green hydrogen per year. The aim is to use 90% of the green hydrogen production for consumption by the main energy-intensive industries in the area, such as paper, glass, steel, food and automotive, contributing to their decarbonisation and the reduction of their CO2 emissions, including Plug Power’s customers in material handling, stationary power, and on-road mobility applications. The remaining 10% will be used for the transport sector through the installation of a hydrogen station at the same location.
The project, set to create around 500 jobs, envisages the possibility to expand the hydrogen plant in the future, depending on the evolution of demand, to double the initially planned power (50MW) of electrolysis.
María Chivite, President of Navarra, said the regional government is declaring the Valle H2V Navarra project an investment of interest for the region at its session tomorrow which will “speed up its processing and development”.
She also highlighted the strategic nature of this project, not only because of the investment and jobs created, but also because it will provide clean energy to the industrial ecosystem of the region, where there are companies that are large consumers of energy, and it will place Sangüesa “on the innovation map”.
The project brings together all the key elements of the green hydrogen value chain: renewable energy generation, production infrastructure, storage, and distribution of green hydrogen. At this time, it will be one of the largest hydrogen plants commissioned in Europe.
Rafael Mateo, Chairman of ACCIONAPLUG and CEO of ACCIONA Energía, said Valle H2V Navarra was created with the objective of being the first operational green hydrogen generation plant at industrial scale in Navarra, and to give a qualitative and quantitative boost to the decarbonisation of the industry in the region.
He said, “In addition, this project is of particular interest thanks to its scalability and replicability, as it will provide an operational example of the contribution of green hydrogen in the energy transition.”
The project enables the government of Navarra to comply with the Navarra Green Hydrogen Agenda, a roadmap for the development of a green hydrogen ecosystem, which foresees the installation of between 10MW and 30MW of production by 2024 and 150MW by 2030 in the region.