A Dutch energy consortium has produced green hydrogen at an operating offshore gas platform for the first time, testing whether existing North Sea infrastructure can be repurposed as part of the region’s energy transition.
A natural gas platform off the Dutch coast has begun producing green hydrogen using electricity generated from offshore wind, in a pilot project that could provide a blueprint for combining renewable energy with existing oil and gas infrastructure.
The first hydrogen was produced in late July at Eni Energy Netherlands’ Q13a-A platform, located around 13 kilometres off Scheveningen near The Hague.
The project, known as PosHYdon, brings together three different offshore energy activities at the same site: natural gas production, renewable electricity and hydrogen generation. Its developers describe it as the first project worldwide to demonstrate the combination on an operational offshore platform.
The system uses seawater as its starting point. The water is first desalinated and converted into demineralised water before an electrolyser separates it into hydrogen and oxygen. Renewable electricity from offshore wind supplies the energy needed for the process.
Meanwhile, the platform continues to produce natural gas.
Testing whether old infrastructure can support new energy
Beyond producing hydrogen, PosHYdon is designed to answer a broader question facing the European energy industry: whether existing offshore oil and gas infrastructure can be reused rather than abandoned as the energy system moves towards renewables.
Eni Energy Netherlands Managing Director Lex de Groot said the project demonstrated that the reuse of offshore platforms for sustainable energy applications was becoming a practical possibility.
TNO, one of the project’s partners, said the pilot would provide important operational data for the development of larger offshore hydrogen facilities.
The partners will now focus on how reliably the system operates, how it responds to changes in offshore wind output and what is required to maintain hydrogen production in the marine environment.
They will also assess the costs and safety requirements associated with offshore hydrogen production.
Results could shape future offshore hydrogen projects
The latest phase is initially focused on achieving stable operation rather than maximising hydrogen output. The project’s developers will collect data on the interaction between the different systems before assessing whether the concept can be scaled up.
The findings are expected to be analysed in August and September and subsequently shared with the hydrogen industry and Dutch authorities.
For Emerson, which supplied automation and control technologies for the project, the achievement demonstrates the potential of digital systems to manage several energy processes within a single offshore installation.
The longer-term ambition is to determine whether similar projects could be deployed elsewhere in the North Sea, potentially allowing ageing offshore platforms to become part of Europe’s emerging hydrogen infrastructure.
Green hydrogen still accounts for a tiny share of production
The project is taking place against a backdrop of growing interest in hydrogen as a potential low-carbon energy carrier.
Most hydrogen produced today is grey hydrogen, made from natural gas using steam methane reforming. Blue hydrogen uses the same basic process but combines it with carbon capture and storage, while green hydrogen is produced by splitting water through electrolysis powered by renewable electricity.
According to the International Energy Agency, blue and green hydrogen together still represent less than 1% of global hydrogen production.
The PosHYdon pilot is therefore less about the volume of hydrogen produced than about testing the technology and infrastructure needed to make offshore renewable hydrogen commercially viable at a much larger scale.
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