On the banks of the Clyde at COP26, with the Blue Zone across the river

Apologies for the long silence. Now that COP26 is over, we are surfacing again. The last three months have seen a flurry of activity for Riversimple – we have been all over the UK in the cars, but nowhere more frequently than Pembrokeshire where we have clocked up thousands of miles.

The official launch of the Milford Haven Energy Kingdom (MH:EK) took place on October 7th.

There is an abundance of renewable energy in Pembrokeshire and this can produce both electricity and hydrogen. Smart use of both can achieve more than either can on their own and the MH:EK project is demonstrating when and how to use hydrogen to deliver the maximum value to the local community. The hydrogen refueller, supplied by Fuel Cell Systems, is using Enapter electrolysers to make the hydrogen on the quayside.

To our delight, we found a Rasa featured in the Earthshot Prize award ceremony on October 17th, when Enapter won the Fix Our Climate prize with their AEM electrolyser! We met up with Enapter Co-Founder Vaitea Cowan in Glasgow, where she was rightly the fete of the city. We have a strong affinity – both our companies are trying to make solutions that are affordable, accessible and can be scaled globally, rather than starting with a premium and exclusive solution.
COP26? It was chaotic and inspiring in equal measure.

In London, we took part in Prince Charles’s Sustainable Market Initiative workshops and had a stand at the Hydrogen4Life event on November 4th, organised by Bosch Technologies in the Science Museum. Sky News came to film us.

In Glasgow, we were hosted by the Terra Carta Action Forum at the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, we were featured by UKRI in film in the Green Zone and we attended the Hydrogen Transition Conference in the Innovation Zone.

Clockwise from top: Prince Michael of Kent takes a spin round Kensington; outside Glasgow University; on the demo track at the Michelin Scotland Innovation Parc, Dundee; at the Kelvingrove Art Gallery, Glasgow.

And we buzzed about the city in a Rasa. One of the surprises was how very pleasurable and easy that was. We had a fabulous parking space thanks to our friends at OREC, the magnificent city streets were clear and the traffic lights slow enough for people to admire the car.

Towards the end of COP, we went up to the Demonstrator and Showcase Event in the Michelin Scotland Innovation Parc in Dundee. We featured in too many podcasts, articles, videos, news bulletins to list here – for more, please visit our website and click on the links.

Hydrogen was one of the buzzwords of COP and the key debate was about what colour it should be. Green or blue? In fact, there is now a rainbow of colours to denote both the energy source and the method of generation, but we were struck by just how much energy (forgive the pun) there was behind the green version. While the cars themselves are colourblind, we are firm believers in green before blue or any other colour. Green hydrogen is all too often defined as hydrogen from electrolysis using renewable energy but there are other sources and paths to creating green hydrogen that we can tap. By the way, is anybody colour-coding electricity?

Riversimple’s Purpose is “To pursue, systematically, the elimination of the environmental impact of personal transport.”