Technology group Wärtsilä has joined a new, multi-sectoral consortium which aims to tackle the challenge of safely storing and transporting clean hydrogen. The Business Finland co-innovation project is led by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland
While the global hydrogen market is growing, it faces significant barriers to adoption due to a lack of hydrogen-compatible materials that enable safe, cost-competitive scaling.
The new consortium MatH2 aims to create a complete, industry-driven and innovative ecosystem to provide essential hydrogen-compatible materials and technologies needed to tackle critical materials reliability challenges and scale the global hydrogen transition.
Rasmus Teir, director, Technology Strategy & Decarbonisation at Wärtsilä, said, “Scaling hydrogen cost efficiently is one of the defining energy challenges for the energy transition – one that cannot be achieved in isolation. By bringing together the entire hydrogen value-chain, we are bridging the gap between research and industry to overcome the barriers preventing the growth of hydrogen across Europe and globally. Doing so will accelerate deployment, while enabling hydrogen to become a safe, affordable and scalable fuel that will accelerate the world’s energy transition toward a net zero future.”
With Europe already scaling up hydrogen infrastructure, including pipelines, terminals, and industrial end-use, hydrogen-compatible materials and technologies pose critical barriers to adoption. Material degradation by hydrogen embrittlement or corrosion needs to be managed, and the reliability of critical locations, such as welds, secured, while enabling storage and transfer of hydrogen at various scales at reasonable cost; this framework poses the most significant challenge facing the hydrogen economy today.
The consortium aims to address these challenges, enabling technology developers to benefit from reliable, predictable material behaviour that supports hydrogen-ready engines, pipeline reactors and fuel processing systems, while also delivering significant strides for researchers.
By driving these advancements, the consortium also hopes to offer components to the market with enhanced durability, lower degradation under hydrogen service, and greater cost competitiveness, which can help accelerate the pace of hydrogen adoption globally.
The MatH2 consortium is utilising Finland’s unique position to harness the hydrogen economy, leveraging the country’s abundant access to low-cost, carbon-free electricity and biogenic carbon dioxide for hydrogen-derivative production, as well as its strong electrical grid infrastructure.
The outcome of the consortium can contribute to accelerating Finland toward becoming a leader in the hydrogen market, set to contribute up to €34 billion annually to national GDP by 2035, creating over 60,000 jobs in technology development and infrastructure production, as well as contributing to the EU’s target of 20 million tonnes per year of renewable hydrogen supply by 2030.
Overcoming the reliability challenges of materials will enable MatH2 to unlock more secure access to sustainable fuels, power, and industrial products, while reducing the risk and cost in hydrogen infrastructure, making future energy systems stable, sustainable, and resilient.
MatH2 has been established under WISE (Wide and Intelligent Sustainable Energy), a Business Finland co-funded collaboration with the aim of developing zero-emission balancing power to accelerate the move towards decarbonisation. WISE is led by Wärtsilä, a company at the forefront of the transition towards a 100% renewable energy future and already leading critical innovation within the hydrogen economy.
The MatH2 consortium comprises 10 industry and research partners spanning the full hydrogen value chain, including materials suppliers, component manufacturers, technology providers, and end-use industries. The consortium includes EOS, Neste, Nordic Tank, Teknos, SSAB, Bumax, SP Stainless, and two research partners, VTT and the University of Oulu.
Earlier in June, Wärtsilä revealed that it has begun validating a new 100% hydrogen engine to power Spain’s national electricity grid in Bermeo, northern Spain, the world’s first demonstration of a large-scale, 100% hydrogen engine. The demonstration marks a significant step beyond hydrogen-ready technologies, proving that engine-based power generation can run on hydrogen in real grid conditions.
