The project called HyAfrica, starting this month and lasting three years, “aims to estimate natural hydrogen resources in promising regions of Morocco, Mozambique, South Africa and Togo and assess their socioeconomic impact for local communities,” the statement explains.
“The project will engage stakeholders in identifying the regulatory and licensing procedures required for hydrogen exploration in the target countries and will compare business models based on natural hydrogen with other renewable energy solutions to understand their advantages and complementarity,” it added.
Hydrogen is considered essential for the energy transition and the European Union and several African countries have already defined strategies that call for the production of hydrogen from methane with CO2 capture (blue hydrogen) or from water electrolysis using renewable energy sources (green hydrogen).
The approach proposed by HyAfrica is different: it “advocates the exploitation of hydrogen occurring in geological formations and its use as a primary energy source.”
