These prospects have been greatly enhanced with Nel unveiling today (April 20) that the “world first” fully automated electrolyser production facility in Herøya, Norway, has now come online.
This pioneering new plant at Herøya currently has 500MW of production capacity. With further investment, this figure can rise to 2GW, a sizeable portion of the 10GW of capacity Nel is targeting to reach within 2025, if required by the market.
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Officially being opened today, the plant will support the growing demand for hydrogen by increasing the industrial-scale rollout of electrolyser systems which are integral to supporting the hydrogen community.
With automation, Nel has said it will help reduce the overall cost of hydrogen with the company also said to be on track to make green renewable hydrogen as cheap, or cheaper, to produce than natural-gas-based hydrogen by 2025.
Nel is also reiterating its goal of delivering green hydrogen at $1.5/kg, and to achieve this, capex must be reduced to a quarter of today’s level.
Jon André Løkke, CEO of Nel ASA, said, “Half of the savings we need to make will come from scale-up and increased efficiency in production. The rest will come from the economy of scale, and from effective industrial partnerships.
“At Herøya we are producing the best alkaline electrolysers in the world. The next step would be to industrialise our PEM technology in the US in a similar way. Our large-scale concepts allow us to optimise the overall capex and realise synergies to reduce cost.”
Terje Lien Aasland, Norwegian Minister of Energy and Petroleum, said, “Nel’s new factory at Herøya is a step in the right direction towards a future without emissions. In a growing hydrogen market, even more electrolysers are needed, and it will be a sign of quality that the electrolysers are marked.
“Norway has competitive and competent industrial environments that can contribute to hydrogen development. Not least at Herøya.”
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