Doosan Hydrogen Drones Take Flight in the Netherlands

Doosan hydrogen drones will take flight in the Netherlands, testing offshore solutions including drone delivery, marine monitoring, and search and rescue.

South Korean Doosan Mobility Innovation (DMI) has penned a deal with Dutch government agency NHN (Development Agency Noord-Holland Noord, NHN), a regional development organization and governing agency for maritime economic development support project METIP.

As part of the METIP project, METIP partner DroneQ Aerial Services will be the local drone services provider, operating the Doosan hydrogen drones.   The Doosan solutions feature hydrogen fuel cell “powerpacks” which give their commercial platforms a flight endurance of more than 2 hours.  Projects will include drone delivery, lifesaving applications like search and rescue, environmental monitoring, facility inspections and reconnaisance.

Doosan has already participated in delivery of emergency relief supplies between islands at a distance of 70 km, in a project with the U.S. Department of Health in 2019; and has worldwide customers using their aircraft for commercial delivery of PPE, search and rescue, and gas pipeline monitoring.  The company hopes that participation in the METIP project in the Netherlands will lead to a greater marketshare in Europe.

DMI CEO Doo-Soon Lee said, “This project in the North Sea is based on the actual demand of energy companies, so if this project is successfully completed, we expect that it will be of great help in product promotion… We will develop a business model project that will apply and utilize various empirical data gathered and use it as a basis to enter the European market.”