Global energy and electricity provider Iberdrola announced today plans to invest approximately $170 million to build a large-scale green hydrogen plant at Felixtowe, the largest port in the UK, supplying clean fuel to vehicles and machinery.

Hydrogen is viewed as one of the key building blocks of the transition to a cleaner energy future, particularly for sectors with difficult to abate emissions, in which renewable energy solutions such as wind or solar are less practical. The development of clean hydrogen capacity, such as green hydrogen, which uses renewable energy to power the process to extract hydrogen from other materials will require massive investments in areas including infrastructure, electrolysis, and transport.

Iberdrola stated that the green hydrogen from the new plant will be produced through an electrolyser that splits water into hydrogen and oxygen using electricity from renewable sources.

The project will be developed by Iberdrola’s UK subsidiary, ScottishPower and port network Hutchison Ports. The plant, which will be operational in 2026, will produce 14,000 tons per year of renewable hydrogen in a first phase, which can be doubled in the future.

Iberdrola said that the plant will be capable of fueling up to 1,300 green hydrogen trucks and will be used to provide clean fuel for trains transporting goods to the port.

According to the company, the Felixtowe port is located close to the offshore wind farms that it is developing in the British North Sea waters. In 2020, ScottishPower Renewables announced the completion of the 714 MW East Anglia ONE offshore windfarm in the area, followed by plans to invest £10 billion in the UK through 2025, including £6 billion through Scottish Power, for the development of the East Anglia Hub, which will bring together three projects with a total installed capacity of 2,900 MW.

Barry Carruthers, Hydrogen Director at ScottishPower said:

“This strategically important project could potentially create a clean fuels hub that could unlock nationally significant decarbonisation for the region, as well as playing a role in international markets.  It’s perfectly located not far from our existing and future offshore windfarms in the East Anglia region, and demonstrates how renewable electricity and green hydrogen can now start to help to decarbonise road, rail, shipping and industry.”