In June 2020, the German government published the National Hydrogen Strategy with the participation of five ministries (Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy, Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety, Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure, Federal Ministry of Education and Research) in which it declared "green" hydrogen to be a key future technology.
The Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco in Germany, Zohour Alaoui, was also invited to this event. In a press statement she announced the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the Moroccan Ministry of Energy, Mines and Environment and the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. The aim of this alliance is to develop and promote the "Power-to-X" sector in Morocco and to establish the first industrial plant for green hydrogen in Africa.
As a partner of the associated Moroccan Research Institute for Solar Energy and New Energies (IRESEN), the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft is also participating in this venture. On the Fraunhofer side, several institutes are involved. In her statement, Ambassador Alaoui also refers to studies prepared in advance by the Fraunhofer Institutes IGB, IMWS and ISI, which were already presented at the Moroccan Ministry of Energy in Rabat in February 2019.
Furthermore, the IGB and IMWS are already active in Morocco within the framework of the project "Green Ammonia": This project aims to find new solutions and establish technologies to efficiently produce green hydrogen and green ammonia and use them as sustainable raw materials for the fertilizer industry. Together with the phosphate company OCP Group and the research institute Green Energy Park, the IGB is currently preparing the construction of a demonstration plant for the synthesis of Green Ammonia in Morocco. The demonstration plant has a capacity of about four tons per day and is used for the technical and economic testing of two electrolyzer technologies and ammonia synthesis in a realistic intermittent operation and on an industrial scale. IGB's know-how will be used to upscale the technology. As the world's leading producer of phosphate derivatives, OCP is one of the major importers of ammonia and processes it into various types of fertilizer. With this project, the company is pursuing the medium-term goal of covering part of its ammonia demands with CO2-neutral ammonia.
More information
- Fraunhofer IGB (29.07.2020): Fraunhofer research for German-Moroccan hydrogen initiative
