Valenciaport — 2023-06-17
Members Corner
Valenciaport has received international recognition in environmental matters for its commitment to the use of hydrogen in port activity and its firm commitment to decarbonisation. Specifically, the H2Ports project has received an award at the Green Gas Mobility Summit. This award-winning and internationally recognised initiative, which is already being developed in the Port of València, has as its main objective to test and validate hydrogen technologies on port machinery that allow for applicable and real solutions without affecting the performance and safety of port operations and producing zero local emissions.
This project includes the hydrogen plant of the Port of València which was installed in January 2023 on the Xità quay. A hydrogen supply station will supply this clean energy to the two prototypes of port machinery -along with a mobile hydrogen plant-. The hydrogenerators are already being used to supply this clean energy to the world’s first hydrogen-powered 4×4 tractor unit, which has been operating since April 2023 at Grimaldi Group’s Valencia Terminal Europa (VALTE), and these hydrogenerators will also supply a hydrogen ReachStacker (container stacker) that Hyster is developing, and which will begin testing in a few days at the MSC terminal.
The European project “H2PORTS – Implementing Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Technologies in Ports” is coordinated by the Valenciaport Foundation, in close collaboration with the Port Authority of Valencia (PAV) and funded by the Clean Hydrogen Partnership programme. H2Ports entails a total investment of €4m and involves, in addition to the Valenciaport Foundation and the Port Authority of Valencia, the National Hydrogen Centre, and the private companies MSC Terminal Valencia, Grimaldi Group, Carburos Metálicos, Hyster-Yale, Atena Distretto Alta Tecnologia Energia Ambiente, Ballard Power Systems Europe and Enagás.
Thanks to this initiative, the Port of Valencia is the first port in Europe to have a hydrogen plant within the Port and to incorporate hydrogen technologies to reduce the environmental impact of its operations. It is also the first in the world to use hydrogen to move a 4×4 tractor unit.
Best innovation project
Specifically, the H2Ports initiative being carried out in the Port of València has been recognised as ‘Best innovation project in the value chain of renewable gases’ at the Gasnam-Neutral Transport Entrepreneurship and Innovation Awards, in which it competed with 11 other initiatives. These awards seek to recognise, support and give visibility to startups and innovative projects with the greatest growth potential in the value chain of renewable gases, from production and distribution to use in transport.
These awards are part of the Green Gas Mobility Summit, the benchmark event on sustainable transport in the Iberian Peninsula. For two days, on 20 and 21 September 2023, leading experts will be in Madrid to analyse the present and future of the technological solutions already available to achieve climate targets and improve air quality, such as biomethane, synthetic gas and hydrogen. As part of this event, the more than 1,000 attendees will be able to learn about the H2Ports project.
In recent years, the Port Authority of Valencia has received various awards for its commitment to the fight against climate change and decarbonisation. In fact, H2Ports has already received the GREEN4SEA Port Award 2019 in Athens in environmental matters. The use of hydrogen in the Port of Valencia has also been highlighted by the European Commission and the Spanish Government in its ‘Hydrogen Roadmap’. In addition, Valenciaport has received up to five awards at the World Sustainability Awards organised by the International Association of Ports and Harbors (IAPH). The last of these was in 2022 in Vancouver for the PASSport project which aims to improve the protection of European ports with a high degree of innovation by using aerial and underwater drones to detect any type of pollution and other types of operations.