It comes little more than a month after the Dutch Government announced that Gasunie would develop the country’s first national hydrogen network, HyPerLink, with intentions of establishing connections with Belgium and Germany.

Read more: The Netherlands releases plans for a national hydrogen network

As the most recent addition to the prominent European foundation, the Dutch firm will contribute to the foundation’s goals of ramping up the market for green hydrogen in a bid to decarbonise the economy and support energy independence.

Already ranking as a leading European comapany in the development of hydrogen infrastructure, Gasunie has set itself the aim of evolving from being a north-western European gas hub, to a supplier of infrastructure solutions.

With its membership, Gasunie joins the ranks of companies such as Siemens Energy Global, thyseenkrupp, Deutsche Bank, French IPP, Total Eren, and Port of Antwerp Bruges, which joined the foundation in July (2022).

Read more: New Antwerp-Bruges port becomes member of H2Global Foundation

Han Fennema, CEO of Gasunie, said, “By joining the H2Global Foundation, Gasunie is improving the cooperation between public authorities and the private sector. Cooperation throughout the entire hydrogen value chain will be decisive in achieving the required scaling.

“In addition to transport, storage and import, it will also require local hydrogen production – both on land and at sea. Only then will we be able to satisfy industrial demand and the chicken-and-egg situations typical of market ramp-ups.”

Commenting on Gasunie’s membership, Markus Exenberger, CEO of H2Global, said, “With numerous upcoming projects revolving around the transport, import and storage of hydrogen, Gasunie features as one of the most important European players in the context of the urgently needed energy transition.

“Within the context of advancing climate protection and supply independence, which is vital in terms of security policy, Europe is once again growing together in an entirely new way. This also applies to our foundation, which is committed to promoting the market for green hydrogen and its derivatives across national boundaries and has declared this objective as a transnational goal.”

Established in 2021 by the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWK), the H2Global Foundation was born to promote and advance climate and environmental protection, with the funding of green hydrogen and power-to-X (PtX) projects coming as a significant element.

The foundation has developed a competition-based double auction mechanism, where its subsidiary, HINT.CO acts as an intermediary to purchase hydrogen and its derivatives worldwide. Through the H2Global initiative, the BMWK intends on funding the provision of green hydrogen with backing of €900m ($916.6m).

Read more: BMWK established ‘H2Global Foundation’ to provide new hydrogen funding platform

Exenberger explained, “It is not yet possible to obtain all the energy we need from local renewable energy sources. In addition, the prices for PtX products are significantly higher than the costs of fossil fuels. Despite this imbalance, the most urgent goal of H2Global and all participating companies is to get the market for green hydrogen up and running.

“For this purpose, an intermediary will auction green hydrogen and derivatives at the lowest possible price and then sells them in Germany and Europe to the highest bidder. The negative difference that is expected to arise can be compensated for by the BMWK funding grant.”