19 December 2024
Gas Plant Profile: Nijmegen, the Netherlands
PROJECT: New 500 MW fossil gas plant on a former coal plant site, which it intends to operate until 2045, in contradiction with the Dutch government’s commitment to decarbonise its power system by 2035. Plans to eventually convert it to hydrogen are vague, failing to identify when the switch will be made or where the hydrogen will come from.
LOCATION: Nijmegen, the Netherlands
UTILITY: Engie
STATUS: Approved by the municipal council, awaiting results of a feasibility study. Facing protests by local grassroots activists, who demand a referendum and for the plant not to be built.
Map data: ©2024 Google, © Airbus | Power plant images are only representative
The municipal council of the Dutch city of Nijmegen has approved the construction of a new 500 MW fossil gas plant, which the project’s owner – French utility Engie – says it will operate until 2045. This directly contradicts the International Energy Agency’s imperative that advanced economies, including most European countries, should reach ‘overall net-zero emissions electricity’ by 2035 to align with a UN Paris Climate Agreement’s 1.5°C trajectory. It also directly contradicts the Dutch government’s commitment to decarbonise its power system by 2035, and Engie’s ambitious renewables strategy, raising questions about the credibility of their climate commitments.
The utility already produces solar and wind power at the site, which until 2015 was home to an Engie-owned coal-fired power station. The company had previously floated plans to transform it into a clean energy hub, but is now pursuing the development of a new fossil gas plant.
On 31 January 2024, the Nijmegen municipal council voted against holding a local referendum to consult on the construction of a new gas plant. The project could move forward, pending the results of a feasibility study.
Engie says it plans for the plant to run on green hydrogen in the future but admits that the infrastructure to enable it to do so does not exist. Engie has given no guarantees that this new fossil gas plant would stop burning fossil gas by 2035 by either retiring it or converting it to run on green hydrogen.
Hydrogen is expensive to produce, meaning it cannot compete with the mature renewable technologies (wind and solar) that have been deployed successfully in the Dutch power sector over the past decade. Furthermore, the prospect of hydrogen as an electricity storage mode and peaker fuel is hindered by the low efficiency of the process, when alternatives such as batteries offer far better performances. There are harder to decarbonise sectors where renewable hydrogen will play a role such as steel-making or heavy-duty transportation, but the power sector isn’t one of them. Given the unrealistically high number of plans across many sectors to use green hydrogen, and how far Europe is from having a sufficiently large green hydrogen supply, it is unlikely that the plant would be running on green hydrogen by 2035.
The Netherlands is transitioning to a renewables-based power system. Its National Energy and Climate Plan includes a target of 95.5 percent renewable share of the power mix by 2040. Wind and solar are soaring, the country is on track to exit coal by 2029, and gas will be next to go. Investment should focus on expanding renewables-based technologies: solar, wind, heat pumps and battery storage, as well as grids. A new fossil gas plant could undermine this progress, particularly because the Netherlands doesn’t have a plant-by-plant roadmap to guide the decrease of its gas fleet.
Extinction Rebellion has been organising a series of protests against the power plant project. In January 2024, 101 people were arrested after staging a sit-in which blocked a major street. The group called on the city council to hold a referendum before allowing Engie to build the plant, and protested again in June 2024, where a bridge was blocked.