First Hydrogen Refuelling of Vessel Completed at Port of La Spezia

• The Port of La Spezia has completed Italy's first hydrogen bunkering operation at a dockside location, with Bluenergy Revolution transferring hydrogen from a mobile land vehicle to a vessel at the Baglietto Shipyard using low-pressure metal hydride storage technology — the same system used by the Italian Navy's U212 submarines.

• The operation, authorised by the Eastern Ligurian Sea Port Authority, ran through a full multi-phase safety protocol and was declared successful, establishing a proof-of-concept for low-pressure hydrogen transfer in a working port environment.

The Port of La Spezia has quietly logged a milestone that the wider maritime decarbonisation industry will want to pay attention to. Bluenergy Revolution has completed the first hydrogen refuelling operation from a mobile dockside vehicle to a vessel in an Italian port, carried out at the Baglietto Shipyard under authorisation from the Eastern Ligurian Sea Port Authority. All required safety conditions were met. The procedure went exactly as planned.

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The operation was authorised by Energy and Environment Department Director Engineer Mirko Leonardi, following a favourable opinion from the services conference. It was conducted in several defined phases: initial preparation of vehicles and the work area; a safety briefing with all personnel; pre-transfer preparation; the hydrogen transfer itself; closure of the transfer; and final clearance of the area.

The Port Authority: “Metal hydride technology allows the use of low-pressure hydrogen sources and does not require advanced temperature or flow controls, as the absorption of hydrogen is automatically regulated by the pressure and temperature of the hydrides themselves, therefore, the refueling is intrinsically safe.”

“The operation went as expected, demonstrating the feasibility of safely carrying out hydrogen transfers at low pressures (30 bar) thanks to the use of onboard storage systems based on metal hydride technology, the same technology used by the Italian Navy's U212 submarines, which has been carrying out refueling operations at the Arsenal in the port of La Spezia for decades, the same technology implemented in Baglietto's experimental BZero plant and planned for integration on board yachts.”

“Metal hydride technology allows the use of low-pressure hydrogen sources and does not require advanced temperature or flow controls, as the absorption of hydrogen is automatically regulated by the pressure and temperature of the hydrides themselves, therefore, the refueling is intrinsically safe.”