Egypt to Supply EU with Green Hydrogen Worth About €400 Million
The agreement is for a 5-year term, during which Egypt will export 259,000 tons of green hydrogen
A five-year contract worth 397 million euros has been signed between German government fund H2Global and United Arab Emirates company Fertiglobe Plc. to supply green hydrogen from Egypt to the European Union. In a statement quoted by Bloomberg news agency, Fertiglobe Plc. which controls the plant under construction in Egypt, stressed that it will commit to supplying green hydrogen to Europe at a fixed price of 1000 euros per ton: “The project, which is being implemented in Egypt, guarantees the supply of green hydrogen for the duration of the contract,” the United Arab Emirates-based company emphasized.
Under the agreement, H2Global will purchase at least 259,000 tons of green ammonia, also called carbon-free hydrogen carrier (CFH), from Egypt between 2027 and 2033. According to a statement from the German Ministry of Economic Affairs, in an effort to accelerate the energy transition, “H2Global will resell green hydrogen at a reduced price to other interested companies not only in Germany, but throughout the European Union.”
Green hydrogen, i.e. hydrogen produced in an environmentally friendly way, has great energy potential, which has so far been held back by the complexities of production, storage and especially transportation. Transporting hydrogen in ammonia (NH3) and then separating it at the destination point could be a cheap and efficient way to solve this problem. “Ammonia,” writes the International Energy Agency, “is one of the few materials that can be economically produced, efficiently transported, and processed directly to produce hydrogen and a non-polluting by-product.
The agreement is part of the Egyptian Green Hydrogen Project, launched in November 2022 at the UNFCCC 27 Climate Summit (COP27) held in Sharm el-Sheikh, an Egyptian seaside city on the Red Sea, and includes a $417 million investment in some innovative industries in the Suez Canal Special Economic Zone (SCZone). Currently, production at Fertiglobe Plc.’s Egyptian plant is at the pilot stage. Nevertheless, in November 2023, the company managed to export the world’s first shipment of green hydrogen to India.
