German gas grid operator OGE joins hydrogen pipeline project

OGE Energy

18/10/2023 11:52

(Repeats story with no changes to text.)
       MADRID, Oct 18 (Reuters) - 
    German gas grid operator Open Grid Europe (OGE) is joining
its French, Spanish and Portuguese peers working to develop a
multibillion-euro hydrogen pipeline connecting the Iberian
peninsula to France and on to Central Europe, Chief Financial
Officer Frank Reiners said on Wednesday.
  
        Reiners was speaking at an event on the project, known
as H2MED, where a senior German government official called for
the pipeline development to be sped up. 
  
        "I'm confident we'll be able to work faster on this
project now," Franziska Brantner, state secretary at Germany's
economy and climate ministry, said at the event held at the
Spanish embassy in Berlin. She acknowledged that the path has
been "difficult".      
  
        Spain and France, which are both investing in hydrogen
to help drive Europe's transition to a low carbon economy, have
disagreed over whether the H2MED pipeline should carry the gas
if it is produced using nuclear power. 
  
        Hydrogen is seen as a way to help industrial customers
in Europe's economic powerhouse, Germany, decarbonise
production.
  
        The French ambassador to Germany, François Delattre,
said there must be no discrimination against nuclear energy as a
source to produce hydrogen.
  
        "The hydrogen market will be delayed if there is no
equitable treatment between renewables and low carbon sources"
like nuclear, he said.     
  
        The European Commission will next week adopt a list of
projects of common interest on hydrogen, according to the EC's
Mechthild Worsdorfer, with the companies behind H2MED waiting to
hear if it will secure significant European Union subsidies.
  
       
  

 (Reporting by Pietro Lombardi, Editing by Inti Landauro,
Kirsten Donovan)
 ((Pietro.Lombardi@thomsonreuters.com;))