Enapter receives funding for electrolyser mass-production system

Enapter is boosting its scale-up efforts by developing technology for mass manufacturing of its environmentally friendly hydrogen generators.

Enapter will design and implement the pioneering, automated production line required to massively scale up electrolyser manufacturing and assist in reversing global warming, following months of preparation.

It comes as the energy technology business gears up for the autumn start of building on its “Enapter Campus” mass-production and research and development facility. It now manufactures in serial quantities its AEM (Anion Exchange Membrane) electrolysers. AEM is usually regarded as the most cost-effective electrolysis method by scientists. Its mass production will materialize cost-cutting potential and bring global hydrogen generating targets closer to reality.

The North Rhine-Westphalia Ministry of Economic Affairs, Innovation, Digitalization, and Energy has now announced funding for this endeavor totaling €9.3 million, recognizing its great potential for innovation (see ad hoc announcement of 11.06.2021). It will employ up to 66 people as part of the 300+ employees expected at the Campus in NRW’s Saerbeck climate community.

“With the ELEFACT project, we are forging ahead with ramping up the hydrogen industry. The industrial mass production of highly-innovative electrolysers will enable us to deploy low-cost green hydrogen in many sectors. This technology holds enormous potential for the climate-friendly conversion of our industry and makes an important contribution to achieving climate protection goals. With hydrogen, we are creating the job opportunities of tomorrow.”– Prof. Dr. Andreas Pinkwart, North Rhine-Westphalia State Minister for Economy, Innovation, Digitalisation and Energy. 

The new production line will be capable of automated mass manufacture of AEM electrolyser components, as well as self-assembly into electrolyser cores and assembly and testing of completed electrolyser modules. Professors from the project’s partner Münster University of Applied Sciences will contribute further expertise in electrochemistry-related fields.

“This machinery will break new ground, release the decarbonising power of AEM technology and provide a blueprint for expansion,” says Sebastian-Justus Schmidt, Chairman of Enapter AG. “The automated mass production possible with our standardised AEM electrolysers will make green hydrogen affordable, accessible and scalable.”