Thermax, Australia's FFI to explore green hydrogen projects in India

India’s Thermax and Australia-based Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to explore green hydrogen projects – including new manufacturing facilities – in India, Thermax said on March 10.

Under the MoU, the companies plan to explore opportunities to jointly develop fully integrated green hydrogen projects for commercial and industrial customers in India. The production of green hydrogen at an industrial scale would be a major step forward in decarbonising hard-to-abate industries in India, such as refineries, fertilisers and steel, Thermax said.

Thermax said that the performance linked incentive scheme (PLI scheme), under India’s National Green Hydrogen Mission, could be leveraged for setting up any new manufacturing capacity. In addition to meeting the domestic requirements, electrolysers and subsystems could potentially be used for export internationally.

FFI is in the process of constructing a green energy manufacturing centre in Gladstone, Queensland. The first phase of the project involves the construction of an electrolyser manufacturing facility, with a targeted initial output capacity of 2GW/year.

Thermax said it will bring its experience in EPC and supply chain to the collaboration. Ashish Bhandari, CEO, Thermax, said that the recent approval of the National Green Hydrogen Mission by India's cabinet, which aims to increase domestic production of green hydrogen to 5mn metric tons/year by 2030 and reduce fossil fuel imports is a significant boost.

FFI CEO Mark Hutchinson said, “Through the National Green Hydrogen Mission, the Indian government has shown that it is committed to developing its green hydrogen industry to help the country decarbonise. We are thrilled to be working with Thermax and believe that this MoU with a company of such high standing will help us in our mission to eliminate emissions.”