Green Hydrogen

Think of splitting a water molecule apart using nothing but electricity, releasing pure hydrogen gas as the result. Do that using electricity generated from solar or wind rather than coal, and the hydrogen produced carries an almost negligible carbon footprint. That is green hydrogen in its entirety.

Ordinary industrial hydrogen today is overwhelmingly grey hydrogen, produced from natural gas through a carbon intensive process. Green hydrogen instead uses electrolysis, powered by renewable electricity, to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, producing a chemically identical gas through a fundamentally cleaner route. India's National Green Hydrogen Mission has positioned the country to become both a domestic user and a global exporter of green hydrogen, given its comparatively low cost of solar and wind power, a genuine input cost advantage in producing it.

Green hydrogen matters well beyond fertiliser, it is a critical input for green ammonia, a potential fuel for heavy transport and shipping, and a decarbonisation lever for hard to abate industries like steel and cement that cannot easily switch to direct electrification. It is, in many ways, the single foundational technology underneath most of India's industrial decarbonisation ambitions.