The European Commission approves public aid of up to 5.4 billion euros for the European project ‘IPCEI Hy2Tech’ 

The European Commission approved last Friday, July 8, to allocate €5.4 billion for ‘IPCEI Hy2Tech’. The funds for this Project of Common European Interest will come from public funding from fifteen Member States. The goal is to develop the innovative and sustainable European hydrogen industry and the entire hydrogen technology value chain.  

Hy2Tech 

The ‘IPCEI Hy2Tech’ project has been jointly prepared by fifteen Member States: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, and Austria.  

The Member States will provide up to 5.4 billion euros in public funding to support the implementation of the IPCEI. Forty-one projects will be managed and implemented in 35 companies. 

The direct participants will cooperate with each other, but also with more than 300 external partners, such as universities, research organizations, and SMEs from all over Europe. This broad cooperation network enables the ‘Hy2Tech’ project to cover most of the hydrogen technology value chain. This network will be structured in four main pillars: 

1. Hydrogen generation technology 

2. Fuel cell technology 

3. Hydrogen storage, transport, and distribution technology 

4. End-user technology 

Value proposition 

Hy2Tech presents several conditions necessary to foster the realization of important projects of common European interest:  

• The alignment of the project with the values and objectives of the Green Pact, the EU Hydrogen Strategy, and REPowerEU. 
• The development of technologies and processes that improve on what the market currently offers. 
• The presence of significant technological and financial challenges. 

• The establishment of a claw-back mechanism in case it generates additional net revenues.  
• The results of the project will be shared with the scientific community and the European industry.  

NextGenerationEU helps the European Union to overcome the damage caused by the coronavirus pandemic, both economically and socially. It is a tool to address the ecological crisis and enables the EU to become greener, more digital, resilient and better prepared for future challenges.   

Diego Gonzalez Armesto