In March 2008, the government of the German State of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) has published its Climate Protection Programme. An important component of this programme is the launch of the “NRW Hydrogen HyWay”. The main focus of this strategic measure is to support the marketability of the fuel cell technology by initiating a considerable number of research and demonstration projects. These projects will be set-up along the existing hydrogen pipeline (total length 230 km) in the Rhine-Ruhr- area. Already exisiting local activities shall be linked together and intensified.
Many projects regarding existing locations in NRW will be intensified and linked up. In NRW, hydrogen as by-product from local industry processes is available for first applications in the short and medium term. More than 80 % of this hydrogen is produced from industrial electrolysis with high purity and can be utilized in fuel cells without a complex purification processes. The costs of this hydrogen are expected to be at natural gas level plus compression and purification (if needed). Hydrogen filling stations close to pipeline will help to avoid hydrogen transport on roads and thus reduce its costs. The target is to establish hydrogen as a competitive fuel option and to bring mobile fuel cell applications to market-readiness.
The planned activities encompass the whole range of fuel cell utilizations like transport, stationary and the special market applications. Examples are bus fleets for transportation companies, cars applied in pools of public entities (e.g. ministries, local authorities) or utility vehicles used by logistic companies. Regarding stationary applications a “virtual power plant” of fuel cell systems is planned in the Ruhr–metropolis. Early market applications comprise light utility vehicles, material handling vehicles, uninterruptible power supply etc. The utilization of these special applications will be extended significantly within the NRW Hydrogen HyWay concept.
The projects are funded by NRW and the European Union.
The first projects shall be demonstrated in May 2010 when the 18th World Hydrogen Energy Conference will take place in the city of Essen.