The plants are the largest PEM electrolysers under execution worldwide and will be the first deployment of the new Linde Engineering / ITM Power 10 MW standard module skids for large-scale installations, utilising MEP 30 bar electrolyser stacks.
Dennis Schulz, ITM Power CEO, said, “Strategically, it enables us to scale towards volume manufacturing with certainty and determination.”
RWE plans to commission the first of the two plants in 2024 on the site of its gas-fired power plant in Lingen. The second plant is scheduled to start operating a year later.
The two electrolysers are part of RWE’s efforts to build a total of 300MW of electrolyser capacity in Lingen by 2026 as part of GETH2. Using electricity from renewable sources, the electrolysers will produce green hydrogen for industrial customers.
GET H2 is one of RWE’s four hydrogen projects that have been shortlisted for funding for ”Important Projects of Common European Interest“ (IPCEI) since May 2021. Approval by the EU Commission under state aid law (notification) is pending for funding by the German government and the state of Lower Saxony.
Nevertheless, RWE has now placed the order to ensure that the commissioning dates in 2024 and 2025 are still achievable in the event of approval under state aid law.
“These deadlines would be impossible to meet if there were further delay,” it notes in a statement. “This does not yet imply a final investment decision. It is therefore all the more important for RWE to receive the notification soon.”
The aim of GET H2 is to create the necessary critical mass to build a supra-regional hydrogen infrastructure and develop a hydrogen market in Europe.
As part of its “Growing Green” strategy, RWE has announced its intention to build at least 2 gigawatts of electrolysis capacity for the production of green hydrogen by 2030. RWE is involved in more than 30 projects worldwide at all stages of the hydrogen value chain.
The GET H2 initiative is an open cross-sector consortium, driven among others by RWE Generation, Nowega, OGE, Gascade, BP, BASF, Stadtwerke Lingen, Hydrogenious Technologies as well as research centres such as Forschungszentrum Jülich and the Institute for Climate Protection, Energy and Mobility (IKEM).
The partners of the GET H2 Nukleus project are planning to implement the first 135km of the Germany-wide hydrogen infrastructure, from Lingen to Gelsenkirchen.
Other key elements alongside the construction of the electrolyser plant are the transport of green hydrogen in existing repurposed natural gas pipelines and use in refineries and later also in other sectors. BP, Evonik, Nowega, OGE and RWE Generation have signed a letter of intent regarding the development of the project.
The news coincided with the prospect of redundancies following an “unacceptable” financial performance in ITM Power’s interim results. The UK-based electrolyser manufacturer is shown to have stood £2m ($2.4m) down in the six months leading up to October 21, 2022, compared with £4.1m ($5m) in the same period in 2021.
Read more: ‘Headcount reduction’ expected at ITM Power following financial losses