Green Hydrogen's Role in India's Net-Zero Journey
India aims to achieve net-zero emissions by 2070, making cleaner energy solutions important across its economy. Green hydrogen can support this transition by helping decarbonize industries where clean fuels, feedstocks, and high-temperature industrial energy applications can complement renewable electricity.
Produced using renewable electricity, green hydrogen can replace conventionally produced hydrogen in suitable applications. Its potential spans steel, fertilizers, petroleum refining, and chemicals, while India's expanding renewable-energy capacity and policy initiatives can support its role in the country's long-term energy transition.
Why Green Hydrogen Matters for India's Net-Zero Goal
India's net-zero journey involves reducing emissions across electricity generation, manufacturing, transportation, and other activities. Renewable electricity can support many of these changes, while hydrogen can complement electrification in industrial processes requiring chemical feedstocks, fuels, or high-temperature heat.
Hydrogen already serves important functions in petroleum refining, fertilizer production, methanol production, and other industries. Producing it using renewable electricity can lower emissions associated with existing applications while creating opportunities for its use across additional industrial processes.
This role connects renewable-energy expansion with industrial decarbonization. As India develops more renewable capacity, hydrogen can help channel renewable energy into applications where energy must be converted into another form or used as an industrial input.
Decarbonizing India's Hard-to-Abate Industries
Several energy-intensive industries require fuels, chemical feedstocks, reducing agents, or high-temperature heat. Hydrogen can support lower-emission production pathways in these sectors while allowing industries to adopt applications suited to their individual technical and operational requirements.
Some key industrial applications include:
Steel Production: Hydrogen can serve as a reducing agent in certain steelmaking processes, supporting pathways that reduce dependence on carbon-intensive inputs. India's National Green Hydrogen Mission also identifies steel as a sector for hydrogen adoption and pilot projects.
Fertilizer Production: Hydrogen is an important input in producing ammonia, which is used to make fertilizers. Hydrogen produced using renewable electricity can support lower-emission ammonia production and contribute to cleaner fertilizer manufacturing.
Petroleum Refining: Refineries already use hydrogen in several processes. Substituting conventionally produced hydrogen with renewable alternatives can help lower emissions associated with hydrogen consumption in existing refinery applications.
Chemical Manufacturing: Hydrogen and its derivatives, such as ammonia and methanol, can serve as feedstocks or intermediates in various chemical processes. Renewable production can provide cleaner feedstock options for suitable applications.
Together, these applications show how hydrogen can contribute to India's industrial transition. Focusing its use on sectors where it provides a clear technical function can connect clean-energy deployment with the country's objective of reducing industrial emissions.
Reducing Fossil Fuel Dependence Through Domestic Production
Domestic hydrogen production can support India's net-zero journey while strengthening energy self-reliance. Renewable electricity from solar and wind can power electrolysis, enabling India to use its domestic clean energy resources to produce hydrogen for suitable industrial applications.
The National Green Hydrogen Mission supports the replacement of selected fossil fuels and fossil-fuel-based feedstocks with domestically produced renewable alternatives. Government estimates indicate that the Mission could reduce fossil-fuel imports by more than ₹1 lakh crore by 2030.
This connects energy security with emissions reduction. As renewable capacity expands, domestic hydrogen production can provide another use for clean electricity while supplying Indian industries with locally produced energy carriers and feedstocks.
How India's National Green Hydrogen Mission Supports Net Zero
The Government of India approved the National Green Hydrogen Mission in January 2023 to develop a domestic ecosystem for hydrogen production, use, and exports. The Mission aims to establish at least 5 million metric tonnes of annual production capacity by 2030.
Its expected outcomes include 125 GW of associated renewable-energy capacity additions. Government estimates also indicate that initiatives under the Mission could help avoid nearly 50 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually by 2030.
Policy measures cover production incentives, electrolyzer manufacturing, research, pilot projects, hydrogen hubs, skills development, standards, and demand creation. These initiatives can connect renewable-energy generation with industrial applications while supporting India's longer-term net-zero emissions target for 2070.
What Can Support Green Hydrogen's Contribution to Net Zero
Scaling green hydrogen across suitable applications requires progress in renewable electricity, technology, infrastructure, resource planning, and industrial demand. Development across these areas can create an ecosystem that connects hydrogen production with industries where it can contribute to emissions reduction.
Key areas that can support wider adoption include:
Expanding Renewable Power: Electrolysis requires electricity, and using renewable power can reduce the emissions associated with hydrogen production. Continued additions of solar, wind, and other renewable capacity can provide the electricity needed to increase hydrogen production.
Advancing Electrolyzer Technology: Electrolyzers split water into hydrogen and oxygen using electricity. Domestic manufacturing, technological development, and deployment can strengthen India's hydrogen production capabilities.
Building Supporting Infrastructure: Storage, transportation, conversion facilities, and hydrogen hubs can connect production sites with industrial users and support distribution.
Managing Water Responsibly: Electrolysis requires water. Appropriate water sourcing, treatment, recycling, site selection, and local resource planning can support responsible hydrogen project development.
Creating Industrial Demand: Long-term demand from fertilizers, refining, steel, chemicals, and other industries can encourage production capacity and help producers plan investments around expected consumption.
Progress in these areas can strengthen the link between renewable energy development and industrial hydrogen use. Aligning production, infrastructure, and demand can help India expand applications where hydrogen offers practical value for industrial decarbonization.
Scaling Hydrogen's Net-Zero Impact Across India
India's solar and wind resources provide a foundation for a domestic hydrogen ecosystem. Connecting renewable generation to hydrogen production and industrial consumption can direct clean electricity toward applications that require fuels, feedstocks, or alternative energy sources.
Practical projects are also demonstrating how green hydrogen can be integrated into industrial applications. For example, a hydrogen blending facility at Rockman Industries' Tirupati factory, commissioned by Hero Future Energies in March 2025, uses rooftop solar and a 300 kW PEM electrolyzer to produce hydrogen for industrial heating.
Such projects can provide practical experience in integrating renewable electricity, hydrogen production, and industrial energy use. Alongside applications in steel, fertilizers, refining, and chemicals, these efforts can support India's growing hydrogen ecosystem and long-term decarbonization objectives.
Conclusion
India's net-zero journey will involve clean-energy solutions suited to different sectors and applications. Hydrogen can support this transition by connecting renewable electricity with industrial processes that benefit from clean fuels, feedstocks, reducing agents, and alternative forms of energy.
India's renewable resources, policy initiatives, domestic manufacturing, infrastructure, and industrial demand can collectively support the expansion of hydrogen applications. Progress across these areas can support industrial decarbonization, greater energy self-reliance, and India's broader journey toward achieving net-zero emissions by 2070.