The European Union has placed hydrogen at the core of its Net Zero Strategy, launching its hydrogen strategy in July 2020, as well as the RePower EU plan, which sets targets of 10million tonnes per year of renewable hydrogen production by 2030, with a further 10million tonnes per year to be imported by the same year. The Renewable Energy Directive has also now mandated a target of 42.5% of hydrogen produced to be renewable by 2030. Several countries, including Spain, Portugal and Germany have updated their strategies to increase their targets for hydrogen production. The EU has also approved a number of electrolyser funding schemes from Italy to Spain.

There are currently 309 hydrogen production projects in various stages of planning and development set to come online in Europe by 2030, with an estimated CAPEX value of over USD$121bn. 89% of these projects are green hydrogen projects, with a combined planned capacity of over 45GW. The UK leads the way in terms of number of proposed projects while the Netherlands (39 projects and 5.1GW of planned electrolyser capacity) and Germany (35 projects and 4.5GW of planned electrolyser capacity) lead the way in Mainland Europe. Germany is set to be a leader in hydrogen production with a target of 10GW by 2030, with the country also set to become one of the world’s largest importers of the gas and looking to develop an integrated network for hydrogen transportation centred on the Lingen, Hamburg and Wilhelmshaven production hubs. There is also interest in international hydrogen transport networks, including the H2Med and SoutH2 schemes. Other major markets in Europe include Spain, Portugal, Norway and Denmark.