Paris-based international renewable energy company Voltalia and its Egyptian partner TAQA Arabia, a subsidiary of African leader in energy and Infrastructure QALAA Holding, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Government of Egypt, to develop, finance and operate a cluster combining green hydrogen production with solar and wind power generation.

Euronext Paris listed firm said in a press statement on Wednesday that the initial project will include a new green hydrogen production facility with a capacity of 15,000 tonnes per year, in a greenfield site near Ain Sokhna port in the Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCZONE), through a 100-megawatt (MW) electrolyser supplied with 283 MW of renewable power.

The project will be expanded to 150,000 tonnes per year of green hydrogen with an electrolyser capacity of up to an aggregate of 1 gigawatt (GW) supplied by an aggregate of 2.7 GW of solar and wind power.

The land required by the cluster will be provided by the Egyptian government, the statement said.

The MOU signatories were The Sovereign Fund of Egypt (TSFE), SCZONE, TAQA Arabia, Voltalia, the New and Renewable Energy Authority (NREA) and the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company (EETC).

The statement said the initial shareholders of the cluster will be Voltalia, as majority partner, and TAQA Arabia, while TSFE and EETC will have the right to become minority shareholders.

Voltalia has been active in Egypt since 2017 having developed, built and operated its Râ Solar project within the Benban cluster.

(Writing by Eman Hamed; Editing by Anoop Menon)

(anoop.menon@lseg.com)