US-based electrolyser maker Ohmium will be able to produce green hydrogen in India at a levelised cost of $1 by 2025, its chairman Ahmad Chatila told Indian business newspaper The Economic Times.
“We have a roadmap to continuously improve the performance of our systems and reduce the levelised cost of hydrogen to $1 per kg by 2025,” he said. “This will be our cost in India utilising the government’s proposed policies like dollar-denominated renewable and hydrogen contracts, concessional transmission of renewable for green hydrogen generation, banking of renewable power, etc.”
Ohmium, which is headquartered in Incline Village, Nevada, has built a 500MW PEM electrolyser factory — which is expandable to 2GW — in Bangalore, India, from which it shipped its first electrolyser in November.
Gniewomir Flis, hydrogen analyst at German think tank Agora Energiewende, said Chatila’s statement could be true if India’s policies “lead to a market distortion where hydrogen is cheaper than electricity”.
California-based Chatila also told The Economic Times that Ohmium believes that by 2023, “green hydrogen will be cheaper than diesel at the pump for passenger cars in most cities”, and that, after taking into account India’s proposed policies, consumers will see an at-the-pump price of $2-2.50/kg — compared to the €9.50 ($10.70) per kg currently seen at filling stations in Germany. “This would be the pricing inclusive of last-mile transportation, compression, dispensation into vehicles, and profits for the pump operator.
He added: “Green hydrogen will be competitive in most applications by 2025, and in certain applications, such as serving as an alternate fuel to diesel in trucks. This will happen immediately, that is, in 2022.”
Chatila, who was chief executive of renewables developer SunEdison when it filed for bankruptcy in 2016, is also an investor in Ohmium.
Earlier this month, analyst Wood Mackenzie unveiled a report that said some countries would be able to produce green hydrogen for $1/kg by 2030.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced in August that India would become a “global hub” for green hydrogen, which would help the nation make a “quantum leap” to energy independence by 2047.
