Lhyfe Signs Up German Rail Operator For Hydrogen Rail Project

French firm Lhyfe, the pure play maker of  renewable green hydrogen production, has signed with the German national railway operator, Deutsche Bahn, to build and operate an electrolyser in Tübingen, from 2024. The production of hydrogen here will  fuel a hydrogen train as part of the H2goesRail project. For this project, Lhyfe has selected the Green Hydrogen Systems electrolyser, with an annual production capacity of around 30 tonnes. It will be powered exclusively by electricity from renewable sources (wind, solar and hydropower).

On 23 November 2020, Deutsche Bahn and Siemens Mobility had announced a collaboration to build hydrogen-powered trains to replace the fleet’s 1,300 diesel trains by 2050. More broadly, the aim of the project, called H2goesRail, is to ensure a cleaner future for German rail transport. The announcement by Siemens and Deutsche Bahn was also in line with Berlin’s political will to green its transport sector. Deutsche Bahn, which is 100% owned by the German state, wants to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.

The French producer Lhyfe develops customised solutions to set up local production and distribution systems for renewable hydrogen. To this end, the company has specialised in the coupling of electrolysers and renewable energy plants. In this way, Lhyfe is pursuing the goal of establishing local and regional hydrogen ecosystems and promoting climate protection at the municipal level. The company inaugurated its first industrial green hydrogen production site on 30 September in Vendée and counts more than 60 projects in France and abroad.

In the long term, the cooperation between Lhyfe and the German firms should provide important insights for the planned decarbonisation of regional and commuter transport.

“We are very proud to announce this first project in Germany, with a major partner which has very strong ambitions in terms of innovation and decarbonisation. This is proof that solutions exist. It is urgent that all the major transport players take steps to decarbonise their sectors”, says Mathieu Guesné, Lhyfe’s founding president.

About Lhyfe

Founded in 2017 in Nantes, Lhyfe produces and supplies green and renewable hydrogen for use in the transport sector and industry. Its production sites makes it one of the earliest, and few firms to produce renewable hydrogen in industrial quantities and to deploy a virtuous energy model geared towards environmental friendliness. The firm raised 70 million euros in funding between 2019 and 2021 and inaugurated its first industrial green hydrogen production site on 30 September in Vendée.