Building a cross-border Hydrogen Valley for Europe in the Baltic Sea

The European Union funded Hydrogen Valleys program aims to deliver efficient, sustainable hydrogen hubs that can act as a catalyst and help scale up a hydrogen economy across Europe, while providing a reliable platform for zero-emission energy supply. The objective of the BalticSeaH2 valley is to create an integrated hydrogen economy around the Baltic Sea to enable self-sufficiency of energy and decarbonize transport and industry.  Ballard is a technology partner on the project.

Launched in June 2023,  the BalticSeaH2 the three year project will build the first significant, cross-border Hydrogen Valley in Europe, combining local areas between Finland and Estonia into an integrated hydrogen economy.  The goal of the project is to develop a stable, local energy supply and minimize carbon emissions from different industries. 

BalticSeaH2 will enable over 20 demonstration cases and over 10 investment cases to showcase the diverse applications of hydrogen across multiple sectors, attracting a total investment of over 4 billion euros. By project completion in 2028, the production potential for hydrogen is set to reach 100,000 tonnes annually, enabling various industries involved in the project to utilize or sell hydrogen and its derivatives.

As a technology project partner, Ballard will lend its commercial and technical expertise in a collaboration with ABB, a technology leader in electrification and automation, to design, integrate and install a zero-emission containerized 600kW stationary fuel cell system. The system will be usable both onboard a ship and as a stationary application, showing the scalability and flexibility of a hydrogen fuel cell solution.

 The container solution will be made up of three Ballard 200kW FCwave™ fuel cell engines, the first to be certified by DNV and Lloyd's Register. FCwave™ is built for the marine industry and is modular and scalable from 200kW to MW level, making it a future-proof technology that can adapt to future operating requirements. 

Ballard is excited to be teaming up with ABB to deliver a containerized stationary fuel cell solution system that utilizes Ballard's proven, certified FCwave^TM solution. The system will provide a complete 'plug-and-play' offering that will be of enormous benefit to system integrators and showcase how zero-emission technologies can be incorporated into real-world operations.

Andrew Win Project Development & Funding Manager, Ballard

The program involves 40 partners from nine Baltic Sea region countries including Finland, Poland, Germany, Denmark, Norway and Sweden. The project and consortium were prepared and are coordinated by Finnish CLIC Innovation, with collaborative support from Gasgrid Finland.

The learnings from the cross-border creation of a hydrogen economy will be shared with specifically
identified Connected Valleys, replicated between them, and shared to boost duplication and initiate strong, new Hydrogen Valleys across Europe.

Learn more about the BalticSeaH2 Valley here.