HYLEOS: a project for the future based on green hydrogen

In the future, hydrogen will be essential. Lille Metropole has created Hyleos to produce and distribute renewable hydrogen.

HYLEOS is a project that partly takles Lille Metropole SECAP’s goals, adopted in 2021.

Indeed, the 1st ambition of the SECAP is to accelerate the energy transition towards a carbon-neutral metropolitan area by 2050. To this end, Lille Metropole supports the production and consumption of renewable or recovered energy and the purchase of zero-emission buses.

Lille Metropole develops hydrogen production infrastructures on the territory, mainly green hydrogen, i.e. from renewable energies. 30% of this energy will come from the combustion of biomass, notably from the Halluin waste-to-energy center. The idea is to deploy a fleet of hydrogen vehicles. The nature and characteristics of the project were set out and adopted by the deliberation of the Metropolitan Council on 28 June 2021.

The project consists, on the one hand, in the creation of a production station with a capacity of 2 MWe (i.e. a production of 321 tons of green hydrogen per year) and of a distribution station of renewable hydrogen which would reach a daily capacity of 880kg/day. On the other hand, the project consists of the purchase by Lille Metropole of 42 buses and 5 hydrogen garbage trucks, which will be put into service progressively within two years after the station is commissioned. The €30.9M investment has been the subject of a €7M subsidy request.

The deliberation also validates the principle of a minority participation of Lille Metropole (30%) in the future project company named "HYLEOS" in charge of the hydrogen production and distribution station. Engie Cofely H2 France, a 100% subsidiary of the Engie group specialized in the underground storage of natural gas, has been chosen as the industrial partner and thus the majority shareholder (70%).

This investment aims to diversify Lille Metropole's fleet of 450 buses, which is already powered by renewable natural gas engines and shows undeniable performance in terms of operation, impacts on air quality and grenhouse gas emissions, part of the gas being produced by our biogaz production plant from our organic waste.