Alexey Kaplun spoke at a round table in the Federation Council on the topic of renewable energy sources and hydrogen production

In his speech, Alexey Kaplun told about forecasts for global and domestic Russian demand for hydrogen, as well as about the largest hydrogen production clusters, such as Egypt, Oman, the European Union, the USA and the Asia-Pacific region. Alexey emphasized the high potential for the development of hydrogen exports from Russia due to its successful geolocation, high level of competence in the gas industry and developed gas distribution infrastructure, as well as significant renewable energy potential and the ability to store large volumes of CO2. The most promising region for export, according to Alexey, is the Asia-Pacific countries. Russia can export to this region using hydrogen pipelines, which are already being actively built in the EU, USA, and China, and using tank containers, the domestic production competencies of which correspond to the world level. To develop large-scale hydrogen exports, it is necessary to build transport hubs (marine terminals) with hydrogen infrastructure. Alexey also emphasized the need to develop the domestic market for hydrogen consumption in metallurgy, petrochemistry, power supply to remote facilities and territories, in the transport industry and the need to develop measures to support the hydrogen industry in Russia.

As a key support measure, Aleksey proposed to consider the possibility of interconnecting support measures for green hydrogen projects with measures aimed at stimulating the use of locally manufactured renewable energy equipment used for green hydrogen production projects. The proposed mechanism is compensation for the difference in price in case when the payback hydrogen production price exceeds the hydrogen price of the end user (contract for difference). The measure is applied if the projects provide a multiplier effect on the country’s economy, the creation of orders for the electrical power engineering industry, installation and construction companies, as well as growth points in related industries.

Alexey also proposed support measures such as subsidizing or reimbursement of part of the investment costs for the construction of facilities for the production of carbon-free hydrogen, for the construction of energy facilities and / or the purchase of equipment using carbon-free hydrogen as fuel; subsidizing the cost of carbon-free hydrogen to the end-user; stimulating demand for new technologies through public procurement; creation and subsidization of pilot projects and test sites.