Drees & Sommer to manage EWE’s large-scale hydrogen project in Germany

The consultancy firm with headquarters in Stuttgart is specifically commissioned to handle project steering, approval procedures and engineering management. The planning and consulting company has also supervised the tendering and award of the electrolyser contract as the main component of the plant. “I am delighted that Drees & Sommer is on board with the project. We can count on a reliable service provider with many years of experience in managing large-scale projects,” said Kerstin Kuwan, who is responsible for the project at EWE.

“The project is very complex," explained Alexander Stubinitzky, Head of Hydrogen & SynFuels at Drees & Sommer. “All trades have to be scaled up, and there are many interfaces that have to be cleanly organised during implementation. The project is extremely demanding in technical terms and with regard to organisation and scheduling of time." In order to carry out the project within the planned cost and time constraints, and in high quality, project management, which is a particular strength of Drees & Sommer, is of particular relevance. The company brings project management experience from successfully implementing many complex large-scale projects, coupled with technical expertise in hydrogen production.

The planned 320 MW electrolysis plant in Emden will produce up to 26 000 tpy of green hydrogen for various industrial applications in the region, in particular for the steel industry. The green hydrogen in Emden is mainly produced from wind power.

In addition to the project in Emden, EWE is also planning to build an electrolysis plant in Bremen with a capacity of 50 MW. This will be realised by the city’s municipal utility, Stadtwerke Bremen (SWB), a wholly owned subsidiary of EWE. Both projects make an active contribution to avoiding grid bottlenecks, so they are a key pillar in the energy transition.

The two electrolysis projects are part of Clean Hydrogen Coastline (CHC), EWE’s large-scale overall hydrogen project. It integrates generation, transport, storage and use of green hydrogen. EWE successfully applied for funding for the CHC project under the European Important Project of Common European Interest (IPCEI) programme in February 2021.

Dr. Robert Habeck, Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection, handed over the national funding notice for EWE’s project in Berlin in mid-July of this year. Of the €500 million in funding, €350 million are German federal funds and €150 million have been provided by the federal state government. The total investment amount for CHC is more than €800 million.

In addition to construction of the system-enhancing production plants in Emden and Bremen, EWE is planning, as part of the CHC project, the repurposing of a gas cavern in Huntorf (Lower Saxony) for the storage of hydrogen, the construction and conversion of several pipeline sections, and the cross-sector use of green hydrogen on an industrial scale, for example in the steel industry.

Read the article online at: https://www.globalhydrogenreview.com/hydrogen/30082024/drees-sommer-manages-ewes-large-scale-hydrogen-project-in-germany/