Joining Forces for Europe’s Green Hydrogen Future: SCALE AEM and HySPRINT Announce Sister Project Collaboration

Written By Core Innovation

As Europe accelerates its clean energy transition, scaling up efficient, cost-effective, and sustainable electrolyser manufacturing has become more urgent than ever. To maximise innovation impact and support the EU’s decarbonisation targets, SCALE AEM is proud to announce a collaborative sister project partnership with the HySPRINT project.

Both funded under the European Union’s Horizon Europe programme and supported by the Clean Hydrogen Partnership, the two initiatives share a common mission: breaking through industrial barriers to make clean hydrogen production truly scalable, affordable, and circular.

What is SCALE AEM?

SCALE AEM is dedicated to bringing Anion Exchange Membrane (AEM) electrolysis to industrial-scale deployment. By avoiding expensive critical raw materials (such as platinum group metals) and deploying PFAS-free membranes, AEM technology provides a high-performance, cost-effective, and future-proof alternative for hydrogen production.

The project focuses on:

  • Automated & Standardised Manufacturing: Replacing manual steps with robotic assembly and disassembly, targeted across 10–100 kW stack pilots to achieve up to a 70% reduction in manufacturing costs.

  • Digital Twin & In-Line AI Monitoring: Integrating intelligent sensor systems and digital twins to optimise stack assembly, minimise defects, and improve quality control.

  • Circular Design: Enhancing component durability, stack lifetimes (up to 4× longer), and ensuring seamless end-of-life recycling.

What is HySPRINT?

While SCALE AEM targets AEM technology, HySPRINT focuses on advancing Solid Oxide Electrolysis Cells (SOEC)—a high-temperature electrolysis technology renowned for exceptional thermodynamic efficiency.

HySPRINT aims to industrialise low-waste, AI-optimised manufacturing for SOEC components through:

  • Innovative Low-Waste Techniques: Utilising inkjet printing for oxygen electrodes, PVD magnetron sputtering for barrier layers, and the proprietary Re:Scale method for steam electrodes and electrolytes.

  • AI-Driven Quality Control: Introducing the Advanced Electrode Manufacturing Supervisor (AEMS) to automate manufacturing, track defects in real time, and significantly minimise scrap rates.

  • Eco-Design & Circularity: Formulating design-for-recycling guidelines, minimising the use of Critical Raw Materials (CRMs), and enabling easy component disassembly.

Why Collaborate?

Although SCALE AEM and HySPRINT focus on different electrolysis technologies (AEMEL vs. SOEC), they face shared challenges in the transition from laboratory-scale innovations to mass automated production, intelligent quality assurance, and sustainable lifecycles. Through this sister-project collaboration, both consortia will combine their strengths to exchange valuable knowledge across automated manufacturing, circular design, and digital quality monitoring. By aligning their efforts on common industrialisation challenges and participating in joint dissemination activities, SCALE AEM and HySPRINT aim to foster cross-cutting innovation, maximise their collective European impact, and drive down the cost of clean hydrogen production.

Core Innovation