CEA, ENGIE, Neste, Paul Wurth and Sunfire will work together to demonstrate the production of renewable hydrogen at the Rotterdam biorefinery

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Type of post: NEWS.

Neste has acquired a minority stake in the German cleantech company Sunfire. In addition, both companies together with CEA, ENGIE and Paul Wurth will work together to demonstrate the production of renewable hydrogen at Neste’s Rotterdam biorefinery with Sunfire’s high-temperature electrolyser.
Press releases:
- “Neste invests in Sunfire, leading technology developer of high-temperature electrolysis and Power-to-X solutions”, 6/3/2020.
- “MULTIPLHY – Green hydrogen for renewable products refinery in Rotterdam”, 11/3/2020.

Figure 1. Neste has acquired a minority stake in the German cleantech company Sunfire (extracted from the press release)

As part of its growth strategy, Neste is focused on innovation with the aim to develop the existing businesses and build new business platforms. One of these fields of innovation are the Power-to-X solutions (electricity conversion, energy storage and reconversion pathways that use surplus electric power). Neste is investing in Sunfire whose patented technology allows the production of renewable hydrogen as well as the direct conversion of water and CO2 into raw material for petrochemical products.

Moreover, CEA, Neste, Paul Wurth, ENGIE and Sunfire have just announce a partnership to build and operate the world’s first multi-megawatt scale high-temperature electrolyser for highly efficient hydrogen production. It is the MULTIPLHY project (“Multi-megawatt high-temperature electrolyser to generate green hydrogen for the production of high-quality biofuels”) that has recently been launched at Neste’s biorefinery in Rotterdam.

The project consortium led by CEA, as project coordinator, is part of the EU Horizon 2020 FCH2-JU (Fuel Cells and Hydrogen 2 Joint Undertaking) program with an overall funding of 6.9 M€. The HTE will have a nominal power input of 2.6 MW and a hydrogen production capacity of 60 kg/h reaching an electrical efficiency of up to 85% AC to LHV H2.

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