Africa is stealing a march on Australia when it comes to concrete plans for green hydrogen production, according to research from Rystad Energy, which found the volume of capacity in the pipeline there has surged to 114 gigawatts across 52 projects.
“Sub-Saharan Africa holds a highly strategic position for the development of a successful green hydrogen economy as South Africa sits on about 90 per cent of the world’s global platinum group metals reserves – critical for the production of polymer electrolyte membrane electrolysers,” Rystad said. “The global green hydrogen economy is beginning to take shape, with Africa and Europe becoming a dynamo of production and use,” said Rajeev Pandey, clean tech analyst at the firm.He pointed to Africa’s “unparalleled” mineral reserves which would be critical for the production of electrolysers, combined with the region’s renewable potential.
Rystad said Egypt’s position at the crossroads of Africa with Europe and Asia and its control of the Suez Canal placed it well to become a global green energy hub. It pointed to several projects on the drawing board, including one by FFI involving 7.6GW of renewable energy that was announced at the COP27 conference in November.