During the premier gathering for the global hydrogen community in the Americas region at the #H2Americas2023 Summit & Exhibition, we spoke to global and regional #hydrogen and #energy leaders about the future outlook for the hydrogen industry, including an interview with Dr Sunita Satyapal, Director, Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies Office from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
“So what’s really valuable is bringing together so many different stakeholders across the entire value chain, so hydrogen producers all the way to the end users, the investment community and other stakeholders including now the tech series so we have labs and academia, researchers and especially I think seeing more investors, how do we get to scale.
So this year is the second in person, so last year already we had a lot of interest, this year I believe there’s over 4,000 registered, including the exhibition hall, and so now that we have a national strategy in the U.S., many countries also have national strategies for hydrogen, this type of networking helps to lead to concrete actions and goals of how do we really enable that national strategy to succeed.
So I think the main message to start with was the sense of urgency, so as you heard from our secretary of energy, we have seen the hottest summer on record, we’ve seen the United Nations report that July was the hottest month on record, I think there’s just so much in terms of energy security, the war in Europe, the need for jobs, the economic situation, climate crisis. So I think the first message is really just this sense of urgency, and we need all hands on deck, for example the quote that I always mention is “no one person could whistle the symphony, we need the whole orchestra”, so bringing together all the right players, how do we really get to those goals now that we have a strategy and we have some concrete metrics, analysis that shows where specifically do we see the potential for large scale production and use to meet our collective climate goals, so now it’s really a question of how do we achieve those goals.
It’s broad so first of all we need industry, governments, investors, the whole stakeholder community, but in terms of our role (DOE) being the lead energy agency in the U.S., we cover research, development, first of a kind demonstration, so how do we de-risk the demonstration and then deployment, we have a loan programs office financing. Of course we support a lot of policy developments, so it’s really comprehensive of how do we really jumpstart this nascent industry.
All eyes are on the bipartisan infrastructure law and the inflation reduction acts legislation in the U.S., so of course the hydrogen hubs, lots of excitement waiting for the announcement there, we’ve publicly stated that it will be in the fall, and then the tax credits there too, everyone’s waiting for the guidance that will be coming out from Treasury, and then the national strategy, I think we have a U.S. national strategy but there are many other pieces of the puzzle, so we have funding for electrolyzer developments, manufacturing, looking at the supply chain, transportation, so we have a joint office with the Department of Transportation looking at end uses, fueling corridors from their B-stations. So it’s just so comprehensive but the one piece maybe I want to emphasize is the energy and environmental justice and how do we ensure that we bring together those disadvantaged communities, address all those issues right from the beginning.
Thank you for organizing this, we’ve received so much positive feedback and so look forward to seeing the concrete actions the results of this conference.”
Join us at #H2Americas2024
Co-hosted by the U.S. Department of Energy, join global and regional #hydrogen and #energy leaders at #H2Americas2024 Summit & Exhibition taking place 11-12 June 2024 in Washington D.C. The event welcomes 4000 industry professionals, 200+ Speakers, 100+ Exhibitors and 40+ sponsors to share the latest news, establish key connections and sign business deals to accelerate the deployment of the hydrogen economy. Register your place among hydrogen pioneers.
