Following go-ahead for the required renewable-energy generation, South Africa’s R105-billion Coega Green Ammonia project in Nelson Mandela Bay has now advanced to front-end engineering design (FEED) stage, so that construction can potentially begin in early 2027 and commissioning in December 2029.

Environmental impact assessment work on all of Hive Hydrogen’s 3 300 MW of renewable energy assets is now concluded, following the securing of environmental authorisation for the 1 000 MW Carissa wind energy facility, near Beaufort West, in South Africa’s Western Cape province.

“We’re delighted,” is the comment of Hive Hydrogen South Africa chairperson Thulani Gcabashe, a former Eskom CEO, whose Built Africa Group focuses on developing renewable-energy projects in South Africa under the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme.

With 154 wind turbines, Carissa will clean energise seawater into hydrogen, the key ingredient of the green ammonia that is earmarked for export to Asia and Europe.

The Eastern Cape project is now on track to begin FEED in November and conclude final investment decisions (FIDs) by July 2026.

Requests for proposals were invited in July for a plant with a production capacity of one-million-tons-plus of green ammonia a year; provision for seawater abstraction, desalination and demineralisation; storage facilities that have two 7 km pipelines for 70 000 t of green ammonia piping; a 1 430 MW solar PV cluster of nine solar farms; and 1 879 MW of wind power in two clusters of five wind farms.

FEED completion, ammonia plant construction, and renewable energy generation infrastructure are focal points of the proposals requested.

Hive Hydrogen, backed by Hive Energy and Built Africa, has been working since September 2019 on establishing a large-scale green ammonia plant in South Africa powered by renewable energy to produce one-million tonnes a year.

The permitting of the Carissa wind energy facility is the work of a partnership made up of Hive Hydrogen, the Coega Green Ammonia project sponsor, which is the committed offtaker, project developer AMDA Developments, and Blue Crane Environmental, the independent environmental assessment practitioner responsible for leading the environmental impact assessment process.

Coega is one of Hive’s three green hydrogen schemes, the other two being Albamed in Spain and Gente Grande in Chile.

More than 500 Projects Worldwide

On the global front, the Hydrogen Council’s McKinsey-authored global hydrogen compass reports that the hydrogen industry worldwide has committed investments totalling $110-billion for 500-plus projects that are past FID, in construction or already operational.

Total committed capacity now exceeds six-million tonnes a year, including an annual one-million tonnes already in operation, with China leading the world in total committed investments of $33-billion and 50% of global renewable capacity.

“We’re seeing tangible proof of progress,” McKinsey quotes Hyundai Motor Group and Hydrogen Council co-chairperson Jaehoon Chang as saying.

In the US, Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Energy Association member Air Products last month announced that it had successfully completed the first fill of the world’s largest hydrogen sphere at the Kennedy Space Center of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa), in Florida. Air Products reportedly delivered more than 730 000 gallons of liquid hydrogen, more than 50 trailer loads, to fill the 90-foot sphere. The hydrogen will be combined with liquid oxygen to fuel Nasa’s Artemis missions.

A new green hydrogen facility in Niagara Falls, which is scheduled to begin producing this year, has received a 35 MW platinum- based Cummins proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyser from Accelera, which will double Linde’s US green liquid hydrogen capacity. Green hydrogen and PEM go hand-in-glove in fuel cell and electrolyser developments with the required platinum group metals (PGMs) overwhelmingly hosted in South Africa.

Southern African Activity

Air Products South Africa MD Charles Dos Santos, in a Creamer Media video interview linked to participation at the Global African Hydrogen Summit in Namibia, has outlined the company’s capabilities and vision for advancing the Southern African hydrogen economy by unpacking Air Products’ position in the hydrogen value chain and the factors driving success in this emerging market, while also exploring how the Southern African region can create and stimulate a green hydrogen offtake market and build sustainable demand to support the energy transition.

South Africa’s green hydrogen component company Isondo Precious Metals has hosted Germany’s Minister Reem Alabali-Radovan from the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, along with a high-level German delegation, at its facility in the OR Tambo Special Economic Zone.

Isondo is involved with electrolyser and fuel cell component manufacturing to position South Africa as a supplier to Germany, the EU and beyond.

Europe’s Green Hydrogen Piping

An agreement by a German steel company to buy thousands of tonnes of green hydrogen a year from France was this month outlined by the publication Hydrogen Insight. This involves Germany’s Stahl-Holding-Saar signing an offtake transaction to source at least 6 000 t of green hydrogen a year from Verso Energy’s CarlHYng project in France. The green hydrogen will be piped across the border to supply Stahl-Holding-Saar’s planned direct reduction iron (DRI) plant at the Dillingen steelworks.

Also in Germany, the third generation of the BMW Group’s hydrogen drive system are to be manufactured in Steyr, with the company’s competence centres in Munich and Steyr already building the first prototypes. Further drive system components will come from the technology hub in Landshut.

“The launch of the first-ever fuel cell production model from BMW in 2028 will add another exceptionally efficient high- performance drive system with zero emissions to our technology-open product portfolio,” according to BMW’s Joachim Post.

BMW and Toyota jointly develop the power train system for passenger vehicles, with the core fuel cell technology creating synergies for both commercial and passenger vehicle applications. This close collaboration enables both companies to leverage synergies in development and procurement while creating brand-specific models, according to Just Auto.

Meanwhile, German electronic chip company Infineon Technologies has transformed its semiconductor manufacturing site in Villach, Austria, to run entirely on green hydrogen, following the commissioning of a 2 MW on-site electrolysis plant by industrial gases and engineering group Linde. The PEM electrolysis plant, designed and built by Linde, can produce 290 t/y of clean hydrogen, meeting the Villach factory’s total demand.