Renewable

January 26 (Renewables Now) - Knowledge from the Green Hysland, a green hydrogen project on the Spanish island of Mallorca, will be used to help researchers in Ireland evaluate its economic impacts and replicability on other island communities.

The National University of Ireland Galway (NUI Galway) said that its three researchers will take part in the Green Hysland project, which apart from deploying green hydrogen for use across several sectors in Mallorca, will also focus on determining the socio-economic impacts and identifying skills and training programmes needed to decarbonise the island and replicate the results.

The project will combine expertise from a diverse group of multinational partners, with Spanish gas grid operator Enagas SA (BME:ENG) coordinating. Enagas and renewable energy company Acciona SA (BME:ANA) already ordered an electolyser to produce hydrogen from Mallorca’s home-grown solar energy, as announced in December 2020.

The green hydrogen will be used to power fuel-cell buses and rental vehicles, ferries and port operations, generate heat and power for commercial and public buildings, feed into a hydrogen refuelling station and the island’s gas pipeline network.

The Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Undertaking (FCH JU) is supporting the project with a EUR-10-million (USD 12.2m) grant.

“This highly relevant large-scale demonstration project is replicable on tourism dependent island economies around the world, including Ireland,” said Thomas van Rensburg of the School of Business and Economics at NUI Galway, who is joined by Rory Monaghan and Pau Farras Costa to represent the Irish university.

The efforts in Mallorca hold promise for developing such green hydrogen value chains on the Aran Islands and Valentia Island in Ireland, NUI Galway said.

(EUR 1.0 = USD 1.216)

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