EXCLUSIVE | 'World's biggest hydrogen electrolyser factory will be a quarter the cost and size of a comparable PEM or alkaline plant'
US start-up planning 3.75GW facility will produce electrolysers that are cheaper to buy and operate than any other machine in the market, company tells Hydrogen Insight
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California-based EvolOH’s anion-exchange membrane (AEM) electrolyser has been designed with low-cost mass production in mind, with no precious metals, enabling it to be cheaper to buy and run than other machines on the market, the company said when announcing the project late on Tuesday.
This is because the 3.75GW of output will consist of a single production line, with the factory later adding three identical production lines, raising the total annual capacity to 15GW after 2026.
“Because of the high-speed, roll-to-roll processes we use, we estimate the plant will be about one quarter the size and cost of a comparable PEM [proton exchange membrane/polymer electrolyte membrane] or alkaline plant,” Shirley explains, referring to the two most common forms of electrolyser.
“That’s why we, as a start-up, can build such a large manufacturing capacity; it's actually quite small compared to the other guys.”
“I visited a couple electrolyser factories, and I couldn't believe the archaic processes they had in place. They have to pay hundreds of millions for an old-school factory that makes maybe 1GW or 2GW a year. You can't change the world like that... We're finally bringing low-cost, advanced, and mature manufacturing processes to water electrolysis.”
Shirley explains that the EvolOH stacks “will come on the market in 2025 at a price point well below $300/kW. Compare that to PEM at $700-1,000/kW, or alkaline at more than $300/kW, and you can see the capex [capital expenditure] benefits”.
“For opex [operating expenditure], ours operates like a PEM but at a higher efficiency, and without caustic circulation like alkaline [electrolysers].”
EvolOH (pronounced ee-V’OH-low) says it has a short list of properties near the city of Lowell, Massachusetts — the so-called cradle of the American Industrial Revolution — and is negotiating to close on a site this summer, when its Series A funding round is also due to close.
Rojas declined to say how much money the company needs to raise, but said that such information would be revealed in the coming months.
So how is the start-up’s electrolyser different to other machines on the market?
“EvolOH's anion exchange membrane technology works similar to PEM, except the hydroxyl ions are transported across the membrane from the dry cathode to the wet anode [rather than the opposite direction in PEM machines],” says Shirley.
The company name, EvolOH, is a contraction of “evolution of oxygen and hydrogen”, Shirley says.
“Our name expresses our aspiration: to use earth-abundant materials to enable Power-to-X projects at a scale previously not possible.”
If the company name is not familiar, that might be because EvolOh has not sought publicity until now. “We haven’t been hiding, just doing what we set out to do without the hype of some players,” he explains.
The start-up was founded in 2020 by its CEO, Jimmy Rojas, is a former climate-tech venture capitalist who has a PhD in hydrogen production and energy systems from Stanford University. Chief operating officer Scott Blanchet, who has helped develop the company’s AEM electrolyser, was formerly chief technology officer at Nuvera Fuel Cells, and has been awarded more than 260 patents, according to the EvolOH website.
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