From Hype to Shutdown: Europe’s Hydrogen Refueling Community Shrinks

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Austria has quietly joined the record of nations which have stepped away from hydrogen as a transportation gas. In April 2025 OMV, the Austrian oil and fuel main that had operated all the nation’s public hydrogen refueling stations, introduced that it might be shutting them down by September. There have been solely 4 websites, in Graz, Asten, Innsbruck, and Vienna, however they represented all the public-facing community.

By late summer time, OMV confirmed that Vienna’s Floridsdorf location had already closed, with the opposite three following in fast succession. That left Austria with no public hydrogen refueling choices in any respect. One non-public depot in Wiener Neudorf continues to function for a fleet, however the level stays: odd drivers can now not discover hydrogen wherever within the nation. OMV was direct about its causes. Demand for hydrogen vehicles by no means materialized, stations had been costly to maintain open, and the small variety of prospects couldn’t justify ongoing upkeep and security prices. I wasn’t in a position to decide what number of drivers this impacted, however there weren’t so much.

Germany tells an analogous story, however the scale is bigger and the symbolism stronger. For years, Germany had positioned itself as Europe’s most dedicated hydrogen market. The federal government invested closely, carmakers promoted fashions, and the H2 MOBILITY consortium rolled out a community that at its peak included near 100 public 700 bar stations.

In early 2025 the operator introduced a significant retrenchment. Twenty-two of these stations can be closed in two waves. Eleven had been taken offline by the tip of March, with one other eleven scheduled to close down by the tip of June. The places weren’t random. They had been smaller stations in locations the place demand was significantly low. Cities like Bonn, Flensburg, Ulm, and Aachen misplaced their solely public hydrogen outlet. In Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, and Frankfurt, particular person websites had been lower, lowering the already restricted comfort for drivers.

H2 MOBILITY defined that the economics now not labored. Many of the stations being closed had been constructed within the 2010s with authorities and business funding at a time when forecasts nonetheless urged that tons of of 1000’s of hydrogen vehicles could be on the street within the 2020s. That by no means occurred. By 2025 the variety of gas cell vehicles in Germany was measured within the low 1000’s, and plenty of of these had been fleet or demonstration autos. Non-public patrons had been uncommon.

Stations had been pumping solely a fraction of the hydrogen wanted to cowl their prices. Compressors and chillers require common servicing whether or not one automotive reveals up a day or fifty. Security inspections and allowing are mounted prices as nicely. The operator described the closures as “community consolidation,” framing it as a pivot to bigger, higher-throughput stations that might serve vans and buses as a substitute of vehicles. That’s going to finish poorly for them as nicely.

The headlines that after trumpeted Europe’s management in hydrogen vehicles at the moment are being changed with closure bulletins. Austria’s final 4 stations being shuttered is symbolic, however Germany slicing 22 in six months is greater than symbolic. It indicators that even within the coronary heart of hydrogen enthusiasm, financial actuality is hitting. This isn’t about short-term downtime or deliberate upgrades. These stations will not be coming again.

The numbers make the trajectory unmistakable. Europe had 38 public stations in 2015. By 2019 the rely had risen to 140, and by 2022 it reached 179. That progress has flattened since. In 2024 it was 187. By the center of 2025 the European Hydrogen Observatory nonetheless reported 186, however that determine already mirrored the primary 11 German closures. With the second wave of 11 closures in Germany and OMV’s 4 in Austria, the full drops to about 172 by yr’s finish. A handful of openings, like Greece’s first public station in June 2025, don’t alter the downward development. What’s being misplaced far outweighs what’s being added.

Operators and governments alike have defined the explanations. Demand has not saved tempo with early forecasts. A station can price a number of million euros to construct and tons of of 1000’s a yr to keep up. Hydrogen gas stays far more costly than electrical energy on a per kilometer foundation. Even beneficiant subsidies didn’t change driver conduct.

Electrical autos turned higher, cheaper, and extra handy yearly, whereas hydrogen vehicles remained uncommon and expensive. For OMV, the choice to shut was framed as a matter of specializing in areas with actual market demand. For H2 MOBILITY, the closures had been portrayed as reallocation of assets to stations able to serving heavy responsibility fleets, the place many in Europe nonetheless have illusions that it’d give you the option compete. In each circumstances, the subtext was clear. Passenger vehicles are now not a goal market.

This isn’t confined to Austria and Germany. France constructed a handful of stations however by no means scaled. The UK supported some pilots however left them stranded. Scandinavia noticed early enthusiasm collapse into closures and mothballing. Southern Europe hardly bought past a number of demonstration initiatives. Public drivers are left with little or no entry.

That is half and parcel of my hydrogen transportation deathwatch this yr, and fully predictable. Main operators like Shell left the general public hydrogen refueling house over the 2 years from 2022 to 2024, closing stations on two continents and strolling away from tens of hundreds of thousands in free authorities cash as a result of it wasn’t value it. As I famous in my evaluation of HTEC’s economics in British ColumbiaCanada, the busiest station could be making $40,000 a yr and costing tons of of 1000’s to maintain working. That may make sense to take market share in a progress market, but it surely by no means made sense for hydrogen refueling as a result of it was by no means going to be a progress market.

The implications are clear. Europe’s street transport decarbonization can be pushed by electrical energy. Passenger vehicles are electrifying quickly, and charging infrastructure is spreading in every single place. Bus fleets are following the identical path as extra succesful battery buses arrive and excessive energy chargers are put in. Vehicles are starting to faucet into megawatt charging corridors, and producers are getting ready to ship electrical heavy responsibility fashions at scale. Hydrogen is being pushed to the margins.

Austria’s empty map and Germany’s shrinking community are milestones in that course of. They affirm what the numbers and the economics have been saying for years. Public hydrogen stations will not be simply stalling, they’re being dismantled. The deathwatch continues, and the proof is mounting that hydrogen as a gas for street transport is a useless finish.