Hy2Market’s Fifth Consortium Meeting: Two Days of Progress in Gijón, Asturias

May 5–6, 2026 | Gijón, Asturias, Spain

The fifth Hy2Market Consortium Meeting brought together more than 60 participants from over 35 organisations in Gijón, Asturias, for two intensive days of project updates, knowledge exchange, pilot presentations, and a firsthand look at hydrogen infrastructure in action. With partners joining both in person at the abba Playa Gijón Hotel and online, the meeting marked a significant moment in the project’s journey toward building functioning regional hydrogen ecosystems across Europe.

Day 1 – Tuesday 5 May: General Assembly, Policy, and Pilot Progress

The opening morning was dedicated to project governance and collective stocktaking. Carlos Garcia Sanchez, Director of FAEN (Fundación Asturiana de la Energía) — the host organisation for this meeting — welcomed participants to Asturias. Project Coordinator Dirk Koppert then led the consortium through WP1 project management updates, covering implementation progress, budget status, deliverables and milestones, risk mitigation, and the state of cross-partner collaboration.

The late morning session shifted to knowledge exchange, with partners sharing updates on standardisation and regulation, ongoing policy paper development, Advisory Board engagement, and strategies for reaching regional authorities. Partners were invited to contribute pilot-specific regulatory barriers to feed into the consortium’s policy work — a reflection of Hy2Market’s ambition to not only demonstrate hydrogen technologies, but to shape the regulatory environment needed to scale them.

After lunch, the afternoon was devoted to WP2 and WP3 pilot updates, covering a wide range of hydrogen technologies and applications across Europe:

• Sicily – Peaker Turbine with hydrogen feed: DeNora, Duferco, CNR-ITAE, Power Evolution, and SNAM presented progress on integrating hydrogen into a peaker turbine, alongside a Peaker 2.0 integration study developed with CNR-ITAE, Summit Engineering, and DEMCON.
• Hydrogen compression: HyET Hydrogen shared the results of their hydrogen compression study, while CNR-Rhône and Vensolair presented their tubetrailer loading study.
• Delfzijl, Netherlands – FTP installation: HyE Transstore and Green Planet provided an update on the installation of a flexible transfer point in Delfzijl.

The EU Project Officer, Maja Ferlinc, offered her reflections on developments across the programme and provided further clarifications on project expectations.

The day closed with a wrap-up session and instructions for Day 2, before partners gathered for a consortium dinner at Tierra Astur Espichas — a fitting opportunity to connect over traditional Asturian food in the heart of Gijón.

 

Day 2 – Wednesday 6 May: At the EDP Aboño Power Plant

The second day opened with a high-level welcome from the regional Vice-Minister of Industry from the Regional Ministry of Science, Industry and Employment, Mr. Juan Carlos Campo. Their presence underscored the importance of regional government engagement in making hydrogen ecosystems a reality — not just a research ambition.

From the hotel, the consortium travelled by bus to the EDP Aboño power plant, where EDP Director Yolanda Fernández welcomed the group for a morning that combined site visits with a rich programme of presentations from the Spanish cluster partners. The group was split in two for a guided tour of the retrofitted old coal plant, soon to burn hydrogen!

The site visit brought to life what has been under development for months — a tangible demonstration of how existing industrial infrastructure can be adapted to integrate hydrogen at scale.

Back at the hotel after lunch, the afternoon session turned to WP4 and WP5 pilots, completing the picture of Hy2Market’s pan-European reach:

• Austria – Methanation plant: K1-MET and Montanuniversität Leoben presented developments at the Austrian methanation pilot, with Voestalpine and Verbund Green Hydrogen sharing progress on hydrogen production, purification, compression, and trailer loading at the Voestalpine site. AIT presented industrial use case studies.
• Meio Tejo, Portugal: MédioTejo updated the consortium on results from the successful hydrogen bus pilot.
• Asturias pilot results: ALSA presented results from the Asturias mobility pilot.
• Aragon, Spain – New pilot: Fundación Hidrógeno Aragón introduced the new hydrogen taxi initiative for the Aragon region.
• Constanta, Romania – Bus development: Medgreen and IAC shared updates on hydrogen bus development in Constanta.

Maja Ferlinc once again provided the EU project officer perspective before the meeting concluded at 17:00 with a final wrap-up.

Stronger Together

Across both days, a consistent theme emerged: building a European hydrogen market requires more than technology. It demands sustained collaboration between industry, infrastructure providers, research institutions, policymakers, and regional ecosystems — precisely the combination that Hy2Market was designed to bring together.

From the workshops and votes of the General Assembly to boots on the ground at EDP Aboño, the fifth consortium meeting demonstrated that this project is not only advancing technically across multiple pilots, but also maturing as a collaborative effort capable of navigating complexity and driving real progress toward a functioning hydrogen economy.

The consortium thanks the Asturias partners for hosting, and looks forward to continued momentum as the project moves through its final phase.