Green hydrogen central to fight against climate change

Green hydrogen, together renewable energy, is central to India’s energy transition and the global effort to tackle climate change.
India’s renewable energy capacity is increasing but “it can help the abatement of 45 to 50 per cent of carbon dioxide emission, this is where green hydrogen comes in,” said Science and Technology Minister Jitender Singh addressing the inaugural session of the International Climate Summit, 2021.

Giving practical basis to the plan to focus on hydrogen as part of the clean energy transition was the mainstay of the day-long conference, organized by the PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry in partnership with the Government of India, focused on the 'Powering India's Hydrogen Ecosystem'.

The event, barely two months ahead of the UN-sponsored climate meet at Glasgow, provided a platform for the global clean energy industry and other stakeholders to engage and identify opportunities for international partnerships.

“Climate change knows no borders. Our common challenge is to cut emissions while ensuring affordable and secure energy for all. We need to cooperate across borders to achieve our goals,” said Tina Bru, Norway’s Minister of Petroleum and Energy in her video address.

Partnerships in developing hydrogen as an important component of the energy basket and the transition to a decarbonized economy was among the issues raised by UK minister and COP 26 President Alok Sharma during his visit to India in August.

Drawing on the economic potential of green hydrogen, Bru said that the shift will open up opportunities for new industries, jobs and economic growth. “Hydrogen has the potential to realise low to zero-emission solutions in the transportation, industry and shipping sectors making a foundation for numerous green jobs,” Norwegian minister said.

The conference builds on Prime Minister Narendra Modi announcement of a national hydrogen mission in his Independence Day address. Stressing on the need for self-reliance in meeting energy demands and the urgent need to tackle climate change, Modi had spoken about transforming India into a global green hydrogen hub for production and exports.

“Green hydrogen will not only enable us to reduce emission but also help India across several verticals and align with PM Modi's vision of our nation being self-reliant,” said Singh in his address. Drawing attention to the opportunities, the science and technology minister said, “we have the capability and the capacity to facilitate clean hydrogen energy for the world; this is the appropriate time to get into action and create a world worth thriving in.”

Echoing the sentiments, Ashwini Choubey, Minister of State for the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, said “The need of the hour is to create a su Release of a Knowledge Book titled 'Self Reliant India - Harnessing the Power of Hydrogen'. A guide on energy transformation from fossil fuels to greener options, the book is the outcome of an Indo-Norwegian collaboration.

The summit aimed to serve a platform for engagement to build partnerships and an ecosystem for green hydrogen. Initiatives focusing on knowledge sharing, capacity building, industry and manufacturing, collaboration in research and development, transforming the transport sector were announced at the summit.

To improve access to information, the National Hydrogen Portal, a one-stop option to access research and developments on hydrogen was launched. Norway and India announced the plan to set up collaborative hydrogen competence centres. Set up jointly by government institutions and agencies, industry, research institutions from the two countries, the focus is capacity building—creating a quali?ed workforce of engineers and technicians that will be the backbone of the hydrogen ecosystem.

With an eye to ensure that hydrogen based solutions are adopted on scale and recognizing that no one country or company could offer solutions across the hydrogen value chain, the summit proposed setting up an International Hydrogen Alliance.

On the business end, joint ventures to step up manufacturing of fuel cells, storage and transport applications were proposed. The transport sector emerged as focus area. The idea is to explore the use of hydrogen as fuel for the transportation sector including local public passenger transport, heavy-duty road transport and commercial vehicles, as well as marine, rail, and possibly, aviation.