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New investment in hydrogen as vehicle fuel option for Europe

A new grant from the European Union will help boost the profile for hydrogen as a fuel option for drivers on the TEN-T road network. The European Union is providing some €3.5 million from the TEN-T Programme. The project, taking place in The Netherlands and Denmark with the support of French and Swedish stakeholders, will analyse the current availability of hydrogen at refuelling stations. The work will also propose new strategies to expand the availability of hydrogen as a fuel.
January 21, 2013 Read time: 2 mins
A new grant from the 1116 European Union will help boost the profile for hydrogen as a fuel option for drivers on the TEN-T road network. The European Union is providing some €3.5 million from the TEN-T Programme. The project, taking place in The Netherlands and Denmark with the support of French and Swedish stakeholders, will analyse the current availability of hydrogen at refuelling stations. The work will also propose new strategies to expand the availability of hydrogen as a fuel.

The HIT (Hydrogen Infrastructure for Transport) project, which was selected for funding under the 2011 TEN-T Annual Call, will define the best strategies to move from the current patchwork of hydrogen hotspots to commercially viable for Hydrogen Refuelling Stations (HRS). The next phase will be to address hydrogen as a fuel for long distance transport and mobility along the TEN-T road network.

The project will draft four National Implementation Plans (NIP) for each of the participating countries. This will show how local hydrogen hotspots can be turned into local markets with a sufficient critical mass of users and vehicles and integrated into the TEN-T road network. Three pilots will be conducted to examine the feasibility of long-distance travel between major HRS stations (Rotterdam, Aalborg and Frederica) using hydrogen-fuelled vehicles. The results of the pilots will generate information which will be used for drafting the NIP.

A proposal for the deployment of hydrogen as a long distance alternative fuel along the TEN-T road network will be produced by integrating the results of the NIP and the three pilots. It will put forward recommendations to allow policymakers and infrastructure managers to develop and use effective support schemes for a viable hydrogen infrastructure roll-out in the European Union.

The project will be managed by the 7021 Trans-European Transport Network Executive Agency and is due for completion by the end of 2014.

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