H2Sines.Rdam, a proposed 400MW green hydrogen project in Portugal that aimed to ship liquid H2 to the Netherlands, has been quietly scrapped, co-developer Engie admits to Hydrogen Insight.
This is despite the fact that the facility — which was being developed by Engie, Shell, storage tank company Vopak and shipping firm Anthony Veder — was in line for a multi-million-euro grant from the EU Innovation Fund. The project had,
like Uniper’s H2Maasvlakte, withdrawn from the process before a final grant agreement could be signed.
“Given the lack of clear regulations and considering the current maturity of the target market, as well as the absence of sufficient infrastructure, the different partners of the project took the decision to terminate the project in Portugal last October 2023,” a press spokesperson for Engie told Hydrogen Insight.
However, H2Sines.Rdam is still listed on
a map of “flagship projects” on Engie’s website. The company had also not admitted the project had been cancelled when
Hydrogen Insight asked on 28 February which of the facilities listed on the map had been terminated or shelved.
Hydrogen Insight has reached out for further clarity on which regulations were not clear enough for the project to go ahead.
A Shell press spokesperson told Hydrogen Insight: “After completing a feasibility study with consortium partners, we withdrew from the project in Portugal last year because we concluded it wasn’t economically viable.”
Despite a similar name, H2Sines.Rdam is a different project to H2 Sines, a different green hydrogen project in Portugal which had been implicated in a government corruption scandal at the end of last year. This project was being developed by REN, Vestas, Martifer, EDP and Galp, although the latter two firms exited the consortium in 2021.
H2Sines.Rdam aimed to ship the first volumes of liquid hydrogen from the Port of Sines to Rotterdam by 2028, with offtake from heavy-duty mobility.
However, while Tractebel — an engineering firm owned by Engie — had in 2022 started a feasibility study for building a liquid H2 export terminal as part of the project, one potential stumbling block is the lack of ships capable of carrying vast quantities of liquid hydrogen.
Only one has started operations to date: Japan’s Suiso Frontier, capable of carrying 1,250 cubic metres of hydrogen (or less than 100 tonnes).
While other, larger liquid hydrogen vessels are being designed, it is unclear how many will actually be in the water this decade.
Some analysts are sceptical that commercial shipments will ever be economically viable, given the high cost of liquefaction and low energy density by volume compared to other vectors for transporting H2, such as ammonia and liquid organic hydrogen carriers (LOHCs).
Liquid hydrogen also needs to be stored at minus-253°C, with any higher temperatures or hotspots within the tank resulting in “boil-off” that has to be vented or otherwise used on the ship.
Updated on 5 April to include confirmation of project cancellation from Shell, and 8 April to clarify that EDP had exited H2 Sines as of 2021.
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