Posing for a photo after the Hyguane signature ceremony in the Jupiter Room at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, 12 February 2026 to construct a 4.5 MWp solar power plant called ‘PV3’.
Front row, from left: MT Aerospace French Guiana Managing Director Michael Gärtner, RMT French Guiana Managing Director Nathalie Gouin, ESA’s Director of Space Transportation Toni Tolker-Nielsen, CNES’s Director of Space Transportation Carine Leveau, CNES’s Director of Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana Philippe Lier.
Hyguane – a portmanteau of the French words for hydrogen, French Guiana and the local Iguanas – is an ambitious project led by the European Space Agency (ESA) with French space agency CNES and industrial and academic partners to develop a low-carbon hydrogen ecosystem at the Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana.
The Hyguane pilot scheme aims to produce 10 to 15% of Ariane 6 hydrogen needs a year. In addition, the Hyguane ecosystem will provide hydrogen to fuel heavy vehicles in French Guiana and to produce energy through hydrogen fuel cells, including electrical back-up of critical infrastructure systems at Europe’s Spaceport in case of a black-out.
The Hyguane ecosystem will be completed with the construction of a hydrogen refuelling station and, pending funding from ESA Member States, a garage to maintain hydrogen-powered vehicles.