This week the Power-to-X news came from the plants that exist and the plants that are next. A Swiss company took the concrete first steps towards a 100,000-tonne-a-year synthetic fuel plant in North Africa. In the United States, the first commercial power-to-liquid jet fuel facility graduated from construction loan to operating asset. And in Spain, a pilot suggested that the next generation of electrolysers could shave a sixth off the cost of green hydrogen. Here is our review of the week of 7 to 14 September.
Switzerland: Synhelion moves from evaluation to execution in Morocco
On 8 September Zurich-based Synhelion — a SPIN member company, also represented on the SPIN board — announced a Memorandum of Understanding with the Government of Morocco to develop a large-scale commercial synthetic fuel plant in the southern province of Tan-Tan, in the Guelmim-Oued Noun region. The facility is planned to produce 100,000 tonnes of renewable jet fuel, diesel and gasoline per year from renewable energy and biogenic waste. The MoU was signed with the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the Ministry of Energy Transition and Sustainable Development, the Ministry of Investment and the investment agency AMDIE. More telling than the MoU itself are the steps around it: Synhelion has already secured a land reservation for the site and established a local branch, Synhelion Morocco, with Casablanca Finance City status. Moroccan media put the investment at around USD 1 billion. Co-CEO Gianluca Ambrosetti framed it as the move «from evaluation to execution and toward our first commercial-scale plant in the region». It comes one week after Synhelion commissioned Saipem with pre-FEED work for a 30,000-tonne plant at RWE’s Hürth-Knapsack site in Germany, and six weeks after the company was selected for NRW funding for a commercial demonstration plant in Jülich. For a company that two years ago inaugurated its first industrial plant DAWN, the pipeline now spans three countries and two continents. (Sources: Synhelion, Morocco World News, Trends N Africa)
Twelve: America’s first commercial e-jet plant becomes a bankable asset
On 9 September Twelve announced it has closed a credit facility of up to USD 45 million, led by Endurance Capital and Nomura, for AirPlant One in Moses Lake, Washington. The facility refinances the construction loan for the plant, which uses Twelve’s power-to-liquid technology to turn CO2, water and 100% Columbia River hydropower into E-Jet sustainable aviation fuel and E-Naphtha, and includes an upsize option for expansion at the site, notably additional hydrogen production capacity. The plant opened in June and has since delivered on-spec E-Jet for commercial aviation, with Alaska Airlines flights on the fuel expected later this year. CEO Nicholas Flanders put it plainly: the financing reflects «the shift from construction phase to operating asset». For Power-to-X this is the milestone that matters more than any ribbon cutting: a lender willing to refinance a PtL plant on the strength of its operations. (Sources: Twelve, Fuel Cells Works)
Repsol and Power to Hydrogen: AEM electrolysis pilot points to cheaper hydrogen
Reported on 11 September: Spanish energy company Repsol and US electrolyser developer Power to Hydrogen (P2H2) have completed a 1,250-hour pilot of P2H2’s hybrid anion exchange membrane (AEM) technology at Repsol’s All4Zero innovation hub. A five-cell short stack with commercial-scale cells ran at 40 to 100% load and at pressures up to 30 bar under simulated renewable load profiles, delivering hydrogen purity of up to 99.9% and an irreversible degradation rate of around 2 mV per 1,000 hours, which P2H2 says supports a stack lifetime beyond 50,000 hours. The company’s cost model, based on Repsol operating assumptions and the US DOE’s H2A-Lite framework, projects a levelised cost of hydrogen of about €3.86/kg, roughly 16% below incumbent electrolyser technologies, falling to around €2.82/kg with optimised hybrid power purchase agreements. These are modelled figures, not demonstrated costs, as pv magazine rightly notes. The two companies are now exploring a 500 kW to MW-scale demonstration. The promise of AEM is PEM-like dynamics without iridium and other scarce platinum-group metals; a 1,250-hour run at pressure is a credible step towards proving it. (Source: pv magazine)
Germany: a 5 MW electrolyser for Lusatia’s hydrogen buses, and a call for a hydrogen budget line
On 10 September, Brandenburg’s Hydrogen Day, the district of Spree-Neiße in Lusatia presented how it will fuel the 35 hydrogen buses and two fuel-cell refuse trucks it is procuring with €13.4 million of federal funding. A 5 MW electrolyser with hydrogen storage, compression and a refuelling station is planned in Forst, producing RFNBO-certified renewable hydrogen regionally for the district’s municipal fleet; two mobile refuelling stations in Guben and Spremberg-Schwarze Pumpe are to bridge the gap by December 2026. The electrolyser is to be funded through Germany’s coal-region investment law, with the application filed with the Brandenburg investment bank. In Berlin, meanwhile, more than a dozen gas and hydrogen associations led by BDEW and FNB Gas appealed to the Bundestag on 9 September, as budget deliberations for 2027 began, to create a dedicated budget line for hydrogen Contracts for Difference. Their argument: companies along the value chain are preparing investments whose realisation depends on reliable, long-term framework conditions. With the budget already in parliament, Power-to-X.com judges the chances slim. (Sources: Radio Cottbus, Fuel Cells Works, Power-to-X.com ticker, 11 September)
Briefly noted
- Romania adopts a hydrogen code. Energy regulator ANRE has approved a code establishing the principles, requirements and regulatory rules for activities across the hydrogen value chain; it creates no new technical requirements or investment obligations but sets the general framework. Reported 11 September. (pv magazine)
- Yanmar’s maritime hydrogen fuel cell gets DNV type approval. The Japanese engine maker’s GH-FC series has received type approval from DNV, allowing shipbuilders, integrators and operators to adopt the system with a reduced certification burden. (Power-to-X.com ticker, 11 September)
- Austria builds a liquid hydrogen lab. HyCentA is expanding its research site in Enns with a Liquid Hydrogen Lab centred on a 4,400 kg LH2 tank, for cryogenic materials, component and system testing for maritime, aviation and road applications; commissioning is planned for Q1 2027, with €5 million from the Austrian ministry BMIMI and €1.6 million from Test-Fuchs and HyCentA. (Power-to-X.com ticker, 11 September)
- Nel and Hydrasun to build PEM electrolysers in Aberdeen. Scottish firm Hydrasun will produce Nel’s containerised 1.25 and 2.5 MW PEM electrolysers in Aberdeen, supported by £1.9 million from Scotland’s Just Transition Fund; stack production stays in Nel’s US plant. (Power-to-X.com ticker, 11 September)
- South Korea’s south-east plans a ₩10 trillion hydrogen network. A roadmap presented at the Ulsan Forum on 11 September proposes linking hydrogen production, storage, ports and transport across Busan, Ulsan and Gyeongnam through 2040, as the three regions launch a joint mega-economic zone. (Fuel Cells Works)
- Peru turns to Japan for green hydrogen pilots. Peru has proposed a three-year cooperation plan with nine operational actions to Japan’s METI to launch green hydrogen and distributed generation pilot projects with Japanese technology and investment. Reported 10 September. (Fuel Cells Works)
- MIT extracts pure hydrogen from ammonia electrochemically. An MIT team coupled a palladium separation membrane with a hydrogen-generating electrode via a molten hydroxide electrolyte, eliminating the separate downstream purification step after ammonia cracking — relevant for every ammonia import terminal. Reported 9 September. (Fuel Cells Works, pv magazine)
- Only 9% of announced green hydrogen projects have reached FID. The International Solar Alliance’s «World Green Hydrogen Outlook», reported 11 September, projects global hydrogen demand rising 50% to 150 million tonnes a year by 2030 but finds green hydrogen still below 1% of supply, with offtake fragility, cost of capital and infrastructure gaps holding back FIDs, especially in emerging markets outside China. (Renewable Watch)
What it means for Power-to-X
The ISA report’s 9% FID figure is the sober backdrop to this week’s news, and it makes the three headline stories more interesting, not less. Twelve’s refinancing shows what the other side of that statistic looks like: a plant that got built, runs, and is now judged by lenders on cash flow rather than promise. Synhelion’s Morocco MoU is not an FID either, but land reservation, a local entity and three parallel sites are the moves of a company preparing to make one. And the Repsol pilot addresses the variable that sits underneath every FID that did not happen: the cost of the hydrogen molecule itself. For Swiss Power-to-X, the week also carries a quieter message. The country’s most visible PtX company is scaling in Germany and Morocco, where renewable resources, industrial sites and government backing are on offer. Switzerland keeps the technology, the headquarters and the know-how; the tonnes will be produced elsewhere. Whether that is a problem or a business model is a question worth asking at the Power-to-X Congress next week.
🤖 AI transparency: This text and its visual were created using AI, reviewed and approved by a human.
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