India plans to scale up hydrogen-CNG as a transportation fuel

India has taken several initiatives to expand hydrogen in India’s energy mix, Shri Dharmendra, Pradhan India Petroleum and Natural Gas & Steel Minister, said.

During his address at the Hydrogen Economy: New Delhi Dialogue-2021 event, he said that India is working on a pilot project on Blue Hydrogen, Hydrogen CNG (H-CNG) and Green Hydrogen. The aim is to use blending hydrogen with compressed natural gas (CNG) in sectors such as transportation and refineries.

The minister added, “50 buses in Delhi are plying on blended hydrogen in Compressed Natural Gas on a pilot basis. We plan to scale it up in the coming months across the major cities of India.”

He elaborated, “We are looking forward to introduce H-CNG as an intermittent technology in a big way for both automotive and domestic cooking applications.”

Over the past six years, India increased its renewable power portfolio from 32 GW to almost 100 GW and aims for 450 GW renewable energy generating capacity by 2030.

He said that hydrogen is also capable of aligning with the ministry’s other schemes, like the promotion of compressed biogas under the Sustainable Alternative for Affordable towards Transportation (SATAT) scheme or promoting the gas-based economy or other initiatives on Waste-to-Energy.

A project in Gujarat refinery of Indian Oil is working on producing hydrogen from natural gas using carbon capture technology to produce blue hydrogen. The ministry is also looking into a CNG pipeline infrastructure to reduce the transportation cost of hydrogen.

Other speakers in the event were UAE Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology, Australia Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction, Denmark Minister for Climate, Energy and Utilities,  and the US Deputy Secretary of Energy.

During his presentation, Indu Shekhar Chaturvedi, the top bureaucrat at India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, said India would spend US$ 200 million over the next 5-7 years on the promotion and the use of hydrogen in India.

The state-owned oil & gas companies have been asked to set up seven hydrogen pilot plants by the end of this financial year, Tarun Kapoor, India’s oil secretary, said at the event.

Speaking during the event, Dr Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, UAE Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology and MD and Group CEO of ADNOC said that the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) is keen to explore the Hydrogen market with India’s public and private sectors to support India’s growing demand for energy and need for cleaner fuels.