Power to Hydrogen, an Industrial-scale hydrogen electrolyser manufacturer, has delivered a 500 kW anion exchange membrane (AEM) electrolyser to the Port of Antwerp-Bruges in Belgium. It is the world’s first industrial-scale deployment of the technology at this scale. It is formed from 250 kW stack modules.
Installation has already started and commissioning is expected to take place in September. The aim is that once operational, the project will demonstrate renewable hydrogen production in a high-throughput industrial port environment under real-world operating conditions.
The deployment represents a key step in the development of AEM electrolysis as an alternative to more established proton exchange membrane (PEM) technology, particularly as industries look to produce hydrogen at lower costs and integrate generation with increasingly variable renewable power.
The project is Power to Hydrogen’s first commercial deployment of its M-Class hybrid AEM electrolyser platform. The technology is designed to scale to 25 MW for industrial applications and uses modular 250 kW stacks as the basis for larger installations.
A key feature of the system is its ability to respond rapidly to changes in renewable electricity availability. Power to Hydrogen says its AEM technology can respond to renewable load changes in less than 50 mS, allowing hydrogen production to track variable renewable generation.
The electrolyser also operates under pressure, reducing the need for downstream hydrogen compression and potentially simplifying the wider balance-of-plant requirements.
The technology is designed to avoid the use of the expensive metals associated with PEM electrolysers, instead relying on more readily available materials, including steel and nickel. Power to Hydrogen believes this approach could reduce capital expenditure by as much as 65% compared with similar PEM systems.
The Port of Antwerp-Bruges project is intended to provide a repeatable configuration for future deployments and generate third-party validation of the technology. The company expects this real-world demonstration to help reduce technical and commercial risk as it moves towards larger, multi-megawatt projects.
