Hydrogen investment totals $500 billion to 2030: Hydrogen Council

In the past five months alone, an estimated $500 billion of fresh investment has has been targeted for hydrogen through 2030 as the drive toward deep decarbonization takes hold around the world, the Hydrogen Council industry association said July 15.

Of the newly planned investment, over 80% of new projects are targeted for Europe, although other regions also are demonstrating a rapid increase in project announcements, the council, which authored the 'Hydrogen Insights' report in partnership with McKinsey, said.

"Hydrogen momentum continues to grow," the council said. "Since the publication of [the most recent] report in February 2021, more countries have committed to decarbonization targets and large-scale clean hydrogen projects have been announced, amounting to over 10 million mt of total capacity by 2030 or about a third of total clean hydrogen demand growth expected in the next decade."

Of those projects, 28 are tapped for giga-scale production capacity, 141 are for large-scale industrial usage, 96 for transport, 56 for an integrated hydrogen economy and 38 infrastructure projects.

Roughly $150 billion of the 359 announced large-scale projects are associated with what the council calls "mature projects", meaning a project is either in the planning stage, has passed a final investment decision or is associated with an active project.

Remaining investment includes $250 billion implied investment from original equipment manufacturers and suppliers to support the required direct investment from announced projects, and government targets, the Hydrogen Council said.

Transportation of hydrogen

Roughly 30% of the announced production capacity will be transported either through ships or pipelines, it said. Further decisions are still being made on roughly half the transportation projects about how to transport hydrogen. Ammonia, LOHC and liquified hydrogen are among the options.

"Today, almost all hydrogen is used at the location of production, but this is set to change," the report said.

China could become a major player in the hydrogen market with over 50 large-scale projects announced totaling more than $180 billion in committed or announced investments.

Half of those projects are linked to transportation projects, including Sinopec's plans to build 1,000 refueling stations over the next five years, the report said.