The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH made it clear to H2-international how H2Cloud and H2Global differ:

H2Cloud sees itself as a trading platform for OTC trades (over-the-counter direct trading) with physical execution. The H2Cloud intends to bring together suppliers and demanders of hydrogen and thus support economic pricing. Furthermore, the merging of different market participants is expected to increase market liquidity. All “hydrogen colours” will be tradable on H2Cloud for the foreseeable future.

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H2Cloud was developed by the energy turnaround management consultancy think utilities AG & Co. KG as part of its H2 business services. H2Cloud is, in addition to an event on the topic of hydrogen and classic consulting offers, a pillar of the focus of the consultancy’s H2 activities under the label beyondgas.de.

H2Global is first and foremost a funding instrument. It provides for the temporary compensation of the difference between the purchase price (production plus transport costs) and the sales price (currently corresponds to the market price for fossil hydrogen) for green hydrogen and H2 derivatives. By indirectly subsidising the price of green hydrogen for a limited period of time, the aim is to stimulate long-term market-based demand for emission-free produced hydrogen in Germany in order to provide incentives for private investment in H2 production, transport and application infrastructure at home and abroad as quickly as possible.

The Hydrogen Intermediary Company HINT.CO is an intermediary that concludes long-term purchase contracts on the supply side and short-term resale contracts on the demand side in the course of a double auction model in order to bring supply and demand together. On the demand side, this model enables green hydrogen and PtX products to be integrated into the economic cycle at prices reflecting the market.

H2Global is therefore a funding construct with which the price difference between green and grey hydrogen is to be balanced out, in order to create a supply of green hydrogen on the one hand and to integrate green hydrogen into application processes in a timely manner to reduce emissions on the other. One premise of H2Global is that no functioning market for green hydrogen exists at the current time, as potential supply and actual demand prices are too far apart.

H2Cloud, on the other hand, is a trading platform that is intended to facilitate the general tradability of “different-coloured” hydrogen. The prerequisite for this is an existing market, which is also given in the case of grey hydrogen. Furthermore, H2Cloud relies on direct trading between suppliers and demanders of hydrogen, while H2Global uses an intermediary to balance out the price difference.