Repsol boosts Spanish industry with its largest renewable hydrogen investment in Tarragona

Repsol is advancing its industrial strategy with the Board of Directors’ approval to develop its largest electrolyzer to date. The facility, with a capacity of 150 megawatts (MW), will be located in Tarragona and will supply the Ecoplanta and other refinery units.

The electrolyzer is being developed jointly by Repsol and Enagas Renovable, which holds a 25% stake in the project. It will have the capacity to produce more than 22,000 metric tons of renewable hydrogen per year, which Repsol will use primarily to manufacture renewable methanol and other products with a low carbon footprint. The facility is expected to avoid of up to 250,000 tons of CO₂ emissions per year. The project also allows for the possibility of supplying renewable hydrogen to the natural gas network and the Spanish Hydrogen Backbone network in the future.

The project reaffirms Repsol’s commitment to Spanish industry and to transforming its industrial sites to ensure their long-term competitiveness. The Tarragona electrolyzer will help strengthen the industrial sector and will create some 1,000 direct, indirect, and induced jobs, primarily local, during the various phases of the project.

The partnership between the two companies combines Repsol’s industrial capabilities and knowledge of hydrogen consumption with Enagas Renovable’s expertize in developing green molecule production projects. Enagas Renovable, a company jointly owned by Hy24 (80%) and Enagas (20%), develops projects in Spain that help decarbonize industry and heavy-duty transport.

The initiative represents an investment of approximately €400 million and has been selected to receive up to €104 million in funding as one of the strategic projects under Spain’s Hydrogen Valleys program, promoted by the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge within the framework of the Recovery, Transformation, and Resilience Plan, financed through NextGenerationEU funds. This support recognizes the scale of the project and its ability to connect renewable hydrogen production with its use in industry and in the manufacture of renewable fuels.

Repsol’s director of Renewable Hydrogen, Maribel Rodríguez, said: “This electrolyzer and the Ecoplanta represent an integrated industrial platform that places Tarragona at the heart of our transformation. Together, they will enable us to incorporate new technologies and capabilities to produce renewable fuels and products with a low carbon footprint at scale, strengthen the complex’s competitiveness, and help sustain an essential, innovative and future-ready industry in Europe.”

For his part, Enagas Renovable’s director of Business Development and Hydrogen Operations, Luis Iglesias, said: “With this project in Tarragona, we are expanding our partnership with Repsol and strengthening our commitment to bringing renewable hydrogen to locations where industrial demand already exists. This is a project of significant scale that adds to the network of industrial hubs that are positioning Spain as a leader in green molecules in southern Europe.”

A pioneering project in Spain in terms of scale, the facility will incorporate advanced technology to maximize energy efficiency and use only reclaimed industrial water. The new electrolyzer will be at the heart of two key ecosystems driving the hydrogen economy in southern Europe: the Catalonia Hydrogen Valley and the Ebro Hydrogen Corridor.

The Tarragona electrolyzer joins the two large-scale renewable hydrogen projects already announced by Repsol in Cartagena (also in partnership with Enagás Renovable) and the Petronor in the vicinity of Bilbao. The additional 150 MW brings the combined capacity across the three projects to 350 MW.

Repsol leads hydrogen production and consumption in the Iberian Peninsula. Its industrial complexes have the capacity to produce around 360,000 tons per year, equivalent to 60% of national production and 4% of European consumption.

Since 2023, the company has been producing renewable hydrogen at a 2.5 MW electrolyzer that mainly supplies the Petronor refinery. At the Port of Bilbao, construction is nearing completion on another 10 MW electrolyzer, developed by a Petronor-led consortium that also includes Enagas Renovable and the Basque Energy Agency. The renewable hydrogen produced will supply Repsol and Aramco’s synthetic fuels demonstration plant, which is also in the final stages of construction. In Sines, Portugal, Repsol is completing a 4 MW electrolyzer that will supply the new polymer materials plants, reducing their carbon footprint.