Hydrogen feed-in plant commences operations in Germany

German energy supplier Energie Suedbayern (ESB) and its partners have commissioned a hydrogen feed-in plant in Bavaria as part of a project to repurpose the existing natural gas network for the delivery of hydrogen.

The facility will allow ten customers in the German town of Hohenwart to be supplied with hydrogen via the converted gas network starting from the heating season of 2023/2024, ESB said on Friday.

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The project, called H2Direkt, is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and is part of the larger TransHyDE initiative, which is aimed at developing a hydrogen transport infrastructure.

"Converting a natural gas network to 100% hydrogen is achievable with minimal technical modifications, and the operation is safe. That is what we want to prove with H2Direkt in Hohenwart," Bavaria's Minister of Economic Affairs, Hubert Aiwanger, said during the inauguration ceremony.

As part of the H2Direkt project, green hydrogen is delivered in trailers by truck. The newly commissioned plant feeds hydrogen into the converted network which supplies the gas to customers. In houses, conventional heating systems are replaced with hydrogen condensing boilers.