Etienne Vienot from AURA-EE presented the EU project AMETHyST, which aims to use local alpine ecosystems to promote green hydrogen. Michael Polzinger from HyPa Clustermanagement presented the hydrogen strategy of the province of Tyrol, while Nikolaus Fleischhacker from FEN Research highlighted the history of the various hydrogen initiatives in the province. Daniel Jakob from TINEXT and Maria Lechner from INNIO shared their experiences and recommendations from the joint project P2X.
The experts discussed opportunities and obstacles of hydrogen deployment in the regions.The biggest obstacles to the take-off of the hydrogen economy in the Alps are seen in the high investment costs and the lack of clear strategies and regulations at national and local level. In addition, there are often very strict safety regulations for the use of hydrogen, which do not reflect the actual risk. All experts agreed that it is crucial to set up partnerships, encompassing the public and private sector, willing to run the risk of investing in hydrogen as a future core energy vector. Moreover, it is important to look at hydrogen across different applications, mobile and stationary as well, in order to take advantage of synergies and bring down the cost of hydrogen production and infrastructure.
The highlight of the event was the joint tour of the MPREIS company headquarters in Völs, where an electrolyser and a hydrogen filling station for logistics vehicles were installed as part of the Demo4Grid project. These were presented by the Green Energy Center team.
A recording of the round table is available at the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxA4U2gcI6Q
