Current geopolitical events have led to extreme spikes in both CNG and LPG prices. This has led to LPG shortages throughout the country. Multiple restaurants have shut down.The restaurant sector alone faced estimated losses of Rs 79,000 crore per month (ChannelIAM). PSU's such as Bharat Gas are quoting lead time of 30 days for delivery of LPG cylinders, plus prices have gone up by 14%. Private /black cylinder costs are 2-3x. This is a crisis.
Hydrogen is the only fuel and feedstock source we have access to without having to import anything. China has realised the same and is pushing aggressive policies and a huge amount of funds to make this a reality.China named hydrogen one of six "future industries" in its 15th Five-Year Plan and launched its first national green hydrogen subsidy framework in October 2025, covering up to 20% of capital expenditure. China accounts for 65% of global installed electrolyzer capacity and has committed $33 billion domestically to hydrogen.
I think to understand why hydrogen is so important people first need to understand that it is actually one of the most critical feedstock gases that we rely on. It is used in everything from making your petrol BSVI compliant, to plastics manufacturing, to the production of semiconductors. Almost everything we use or consume on a daily basis, uses hydrogen at some stage of production. But >99% of H₂ is currently produced from fossil fuels — primarily SMR (natural gas) and Coal Gasification — which produces over 10 tonnes of CO₂ per tonne of H₂. Considering that globally almost 100 million tonnes of H₂ is used annually, this amounts to more than a Billion (with a B) tonnes of CO₂ emissions.Hydrogen production is responsible for almost 1,300 Mt CO₂-eq annually — ~40% more than global aviation, which emitted 933 Mt CO₂ in 2024 (IATA). To put this into perspective, this far exceeds the entire global aviation industry! And even if your reaction to this is 'So what?' (it really shouldn't be); the geopolitical reality is that India's hydrogen production runs almost entirely on SMR — and the natural gas it needs is imported!!India produces ~6.5 million tonnes of hydrogen annually, almost all grey hydrogen from natural gas via SMR. Unlike China, where coal gasification dominates, India's hydrogen sector is overwhelmingly natural-gas-dependent (FIPI). Green hydrogen capacity remains below 0.01 MT as of 2024. Meanwhile, India's LNG imports now exceed domestic production, making it the fourth-largest LNG importer globally.
So whether you consider its environmental impact or national security implications, green H₂ is a necessity, not a nice-to-have.
NGHM is an excellent step by the GOI to push this, but we need further upstream and downstream support to make indigenous green hydrogen and related infrastructure a reality. A critical part of this is ensuring that Indian companies are given the opportunity to grow and build a strong eco-system for the entire green H₂ pipeline,Indian companies across the green H₂ pipeline include electrolyzer manufacturers such as Ohmium, L&T Electrolysers, Newtrace, HomiHydrogen, and Waaree, among others. See Speciale Invest (March 2026) and Blackridge Research (2026) for a comprehensive mapping. from SOTA electrocatalysts and electrolyzer technologies for efficient green H₂ production to advanced composites for storage and transport.
The current de-facto approach in Indian industry is to import the electrolyzer stack and other critical components such as rectifier, analyser systems etc. from China/Japan/EU and do the low-value work of setting up the rest of the BOP (a.k.a pumps, pipes and tanks) in India.
This 'Make Abroad, Assemble Here' approach might be cheaper in the short-term, but in the long-term it will kill the fledgling Indian companies in the Hydrogen Ecosystem, just like what happened with solar cells, semiconductors and Li-ion cells in the past.India imports nearly 80% of its solar equipment, over 90% of its semiconductor components — with no commercial fabrication capacity to date — and 94% of Li-ion battery cells from China.
If we want to ensure our country's energy independence and mitigate the spiralling effects of climate change, the time to act is now.