Acciona and Enagás shelve their project to install a green hydrogen plant in the Outer Port of A Coruña. As Economía Digital Galicia has been able to confirm, the two companies have decided not to go ahead with their plan to launch this infrastructure with the support of the European Next Generation funds.
The project once outlined by the two companies with presence in the Ibex 35 was in an initial phase and has not reached greater heights of development. The objective sought with this plant was to take advantage of the electrical energy either from wind turbines installed in Langosteira or even through tidal energy (from the waves) to transform water into hydrogen by means of electrolysis.
Free way to Enerfin and Fisterra Energy in Langosteira
In this way, the Enagás and Acciona project is unhooked from a list of initiatives presented under the umbrella of A Coruña Green Port, which has Inditex’s three wind turbine wind farm and Enerfín’s hydrogen plant as flagships. The Arteixo-based multinational will invest close to 30 million euros to deploy these facilities of almost 19 megawatts of power, while Enerfín, for its part, is planning a hydrogen plant, as is Fisterra Energy, a subsidiary of the Blackstone investment fund.
Through A Coruña Green Port, the institution headed by Martín Fernández Prado aspires for the port of A Coruña to become the first in Spain to be energy self-sufficient and to have the seal of zero emissions into the atmosphere.
The arrival of the Next Generation European funds that the European Commission has launched after the Covid-19 crisis plays a crucial role in boosting this initiative. The boost of this aid would also be felt by Enagás, a company 5% owned by Pontegadea (Amancio Ortega’s investment arm), which, according to Economía Digital Galicia, had applied to receive these funds.
In this way, Enerfin and Fisterra Energy are left with the hydrogen initiative in Punta Langosteira, to the detriment of Acciona and Enagas. The latter deployed more than fifty projects related to the development of biomethane and green hydrogen in the hope of getting the support of the Next Generation funds.
Other Enagás and Acciona projects
The company headed by Antonio Llardén has recently set up the subsidiary Enagás Hydrogen Infrastructures to give a boost to a technology it already uses in the Balearic Islands. There it has deployed its Green Hysland project, also in alliance with Acciona Energía and another thirty companies, through which it is committed to the generation, storage and distribution of renewable hydrogen from solar energy.
It is the first green hydrogen project in a Mediterranean country to be selected for European funding and aims to turn the island of Mallorca into the first H2 hub in southwest Europe. The production of the first hydrogen molecules started last December at the former Cemex plant in Lloseta. The facilities face a new horizon as part of the energy transition that Enagás and Acciona Energía are piloting on the island with hydrogen as the protagonist.
In addition, the project also stipulates that part of the green hydrogen generated will be transported to the rest of Spain through the country’s first hydrogen pipeline, which will be built by Redexis.