Morocco’s green hydrogen potential attracts European investors

Morocco’s plans to become a green hydrogen powerhouse are luring European customers including Germany and most recently Netherlands.

The Dutch and the Moroccan governments signed a financing deal to look into green hydrogen infrastructure.

Germany had integrated Morocco in its H2Uppp program targeting hydrogen projects in developing countries.

But the project that is closest to materialize was announced by phosphates and fertilizers producer OCP to set up an ammonia plant operating on green hydrogen in Tarfaya for a total cost of 7 billion dollars.

Taqa Maroc, Morocco’s largest private electricity producer, has set up a renewable energy subsidiary called Taqa Morocco Green and will also produce green hydrogen in Morocco’s southern provinces.

Earlier this year, media reports mentioned that Belgium’s energy firm, John Cockerill, plans to invest in green hydrogen as part of a joint venture in Morocco where they plan to manufacture key equipment to transform electricity into hydrogen at a lower cost.

John Cockerill’s planned investment follows suit global companies such as Total Eren which announced a mega project to set up plants capable of transforming 10HW of clean electricity into hydrogen and green ammonia.

For that purpose, Total Eren has already obtained a 170,000 hectare site from the Moroccan government in the Guelmim-Oued Noun region.

In November last year, King Mohammed VI urged the government to accelerate the implementation of renewable energy projects especially wind, solar and green hydrogen.

The international renewable energy agency IRENA cites Morocco as one of the four countries in the world with a significant potential to become exporters of green hydrogen.

Morocco has a potential to supply 4% of global demand on clean hydrogen, the agency said.