Italy, Germany, and Austria have expressed their full political support for the construction of the Southern Hydrogen Corridor, a 3,300 km gas pipeline connecting North Africa to Europe.
The project aims to transport hydrogen from North Africa to Europe, with Tunisia and Sicily being the starting and end points of the pipeline. The infrastructure will be a hydrogen-ready gas pipeline capable of transporting both fossil gas and hydrogen-blended gas. The Southern Hydrogen Corridor is expected to be operational by 2030, and it is divided into four segments assigned to four different national operators: Snam for Italy, Trans Austria Gasleitung (TAG) and Gas Connect Austria (GCA) in Austria, and bayernets in Germany.
The Southern Hydrogen Corridor is a highly strategic infrastructure project and has been nominated as a European-level Project of Common Interest (PCI) since 2022. This designation provides the project with simplified permitting and funding procedures. The Italian segment of the project, the Italian H2 Backbone, is approximately 2,300 km long and runs the entire length of the Italian peninsula from the entry point in Sicily to the points of export to Austria and Switzerland. Only 27% of the Italian pipeline will be newly built, with the remaining 73% repurposed to become hydrogen-ready. The import capacity from North Africa is estimated to reach 18 billion cubic meters per year, with the export capacity to Europe reaching 7.3 billion cubic meters per year. By comparison, the TransMed pipeline, which brings Algerian gas to Italy, has a capacity of around 30 billion cubic meters per year, while Tap from Azerbaijan has a capacity of around 10 billion cubic meters per year.
The Southern Hydrogen Corridor project consists of a South-North Ridge of 1,520 km between Mazara del Vallo and the Minerbio node near Bologna, with most of the length of the pipeline being in Italy. The existing pipelines will be converted to hydrogen, except for the section between Sulmona and Oricola in Abruzzo, where the pipeline will be built from scratch. Two derivations branch off from Minerbio, the Dorsale Est towards Tarvisio (337 km) and the Dorsale Ovest (410 km) from Poggio Renatico (Ferrara) to Passo Gries. The latter will mainly involve repurposing, while the eastern one will be a mix of readaptation and new pipelines. Completing the Italian section of the Southern Hydrogen Corridor are also expected 530 km of derivations from the production centers and towards the main consumption centers (hard to abate industry) and two compressor stations in Messina and Gallese (Viterbo), each of 25 MW.
The Southern Hydrogen Corridor aims to help Europe transition to a low-carbon energy system by providing a secure and cost-effective source of hydrogen. It is expected to reduce carbon emissions by up to 10 million tonnes per year, which would make a significant contribution to meeting Europe’s carbon neutrality goals by 2050. However, there are potential challenges associated with the project, such as the cost of building and operating the pipeline, the availability of hydrogen in North Africa, and geopolitical risks.
