Australian firm partners with JSW Energy on green hydrogen projects in India

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From pv magazine India

Australia’s Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) has signed an agreement with JSW Future Energy Limited, an arm of power producer JSW Energy Limited, to explore green hydrogen development and use in industrial and transport sectors in India.

FFI is committed to producing zero-emission green hydrogen from 100% renewable sources. It is actively establishing renewable green hydrogen and green industrial projects globally.

Under the agreement, FFI and JSW Energy will collaborate and conduct scoping work on potential projects in green hydrogen production. They will also explore opportunities to utilise green hydrogen for steel makinghydrogen mobility, ammonia, and other mutually agreed industrial applications in India.

JSW Energy aims to reach 20 GW of power generation capacity by 2030, with about 85% of the portfolio comprising green and renewable energy sources. It aspires to become a green energy future tech company by adopting innovative technologies like green hydrogen, offshore wind, and battery energy storage. Partnership with FFI provides it the opportunity to become a front-runner in green hydrogen applications in India.

The FFI-JSW partnership follows the recent announcement by state-run oil and gas major IndianOil to set up a green hydrogen plant at its Mathura refinery in the Indian State of Uttar Pradesh. Indian EPC contractor BGR Energy Systems has also partnered Fusion Fuel Green, an Ireland-headquartered green hydrogen technology company, to develop green hydrogen projects in India

Meanwhile, Reliance Industries has unveiled its plan to set up an electrolyser Giga factory to manufacture modular electrolysers of the highest efficiency and lowest capital cost. These will be used for captive production of green hydrogen for domestic use and global sale. 

The announcements come as the Indian government pushes for a green hydrogen economy. “India proposes to green industry sectors to replace Grey Hydrogen (drawn from imported natural gas) with Green Hydrogen, and for this, it will come out with a Green Hydrogen Purchase Obligation for different sectors like petroleum and fertiliser. This will also provide huge demand for domestically manufactured solar and wind equipment as well as storage,” said power minister RK Singh recently.

Hydrogen plays a critical role in the Indian economy, with roughly 6 million tons of hydrogen consumed annually, primarily in ammonia and methanol production and for use in refineries. A report from The Energy and Resources Institute estimated that demand could grow to as much as 28 million tons by 2050. 

Enabling cost-effective domestic production of green hydrogen is critical for India to reduce the carbon intensity of heavy industry and help achieve its energy security and emissions targets—as virtually all the hydrogen consumed in India today is grey hydrogen, the production of which emits roughly 9 tons of CO2 per ton of hydrogen.

Author: Uma Gupta

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