Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park celebrates topping-out ceremony for electrolysis building
- Only 9 months after 1st ground-breaking ceremony for shell of electrolysis building
- Delivery and installation of Sunfire’s 30 MW large-scale electrolysis plant to begin in 2024
Today’s topping-out ceremony for the building to accommodate the 30 MW large-scale electrolyser marks the completion of the building work just 9 months to the day after the 1st construction phase. Another milestone was reached at the Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park with the ground-breaking ceremony. The building shell is now the centrepiece of the Central German real-world laboratory for the energy transition, which is testing the large-scale production of green hydrogen as well as its storage, transport, marketing and use. The shell for the energy centre and another building for ancillary facilities have been built in recent months. In keeping with tradition, building workers from Franz KASSECKER GmbH marked the completion of this stage of the project with a topping-out ceremony.
Thomas Wünsch, Secretary of State in the Ministry of Science, Energy, Climate Protection and the Environment of the Federal State of Saxony-Anhalt, joined in the ceremony and wished the consortium every success for the further realisation of the project: “The Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park is a central foundation stone for the development of a competitive green hydrogen economy in Central Germany. With this flagship project, Saxony-Anhalt is moving up into the Champions League. On the one hand, we benefit from the existing hydrogen expertise and infrastructure in this federal state and, on the other, from the rapid progress in the development of renewable energies. The project is ground-breaking because of the way it links climate protection and economic development.”
Before the electrolysis plant itself is installed, further structural work will be conducted, cable ducts laid and earthworks will be completed. The electrolysis components can then be delivered from Dresden-based Sunfire GmbH as early as the second half of the year. Four blocks weighing around 12 tonnes will be assembled on site to form a stack. A total of six of these stacks will then be lifted into the electrolysis building and installed in predetermined positions by the first quarter of 2025.
“It’s great to see the flat site on which we broke ground just nine months ago as a consortium together with the Minister Presidents of Saxony-Anhalt and Saxony is now taking shape as the electrolyser operating site. I can also see the first of the total of 8 wind turbines in operation from here. This means that the first part of our value chain in the project, the production of hydrogen from green wind power, is now becoming a tangible reality,” said Cornelia Müller-Pagel, project manager in the consortium.
Before the start of trial operation and before regular operation (from the end of 2025), air coolers, a rectifier for converting AC voltage to DC voltage and the gas treatment system still have to be installed on the site, and a connection must be established to a pipeline – which is already being converted to transport hydrogen – to the first customer, TotalEnergies Raffinerie Mitteldeutschland.
Photo 1: Topping-out ceremony at the Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park site (from left to right) Thomas Wünsch, Secretary of State in the Ministry of Science, Energy, Climate Protection and the Environment of the State of Saxony-Anhalt; Xenia Papst, Uniper; Sebastian Pflüger, VNG Handel & Vertrieb GmbH; Cornelia-Müller-Pagel, Project Manager of the Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park; Ronny Hengst and Philipp Eckelmann (both Sunfire GmbH). Photo © Rico Thumser/ Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park
Photo 2: Presentation of the official notification of funding for the ‘Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park’ Photo © Rico Thumser/ Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park
