National Green Hydrogen Mission To Be Guided By Empowered Group Under Cabinet Secretary 

The government will set up an empowered group headed by Cabinet Secretary for steering and guiding the implementation the National Green Hydrogen Mission, which aims to make India a global manufacturing hub the clean source of energy.
     
The group will comprise Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India, NITI Aayog CEO, and secretaries of various ministries besides departments of scientific and industrial research, promotion of industry and internal trade, and experts from the industry, according to the Mission Document.
     
The Union Cabinet on January 4 approved the mission with an outlay of Rs 19,744 crore to make India a global hub for the manufacturing of this clean source of energy, and development of a production capacity of at least 5 MMT (Million Metric Tonnes) per annum with an associated renewable energy capacity addition of about 125 GW in the country by 2030.
     
The effective implementation of the Mission requires strong coordination among various ministries and departments of central and state governments, industry, institutions, and other stakeholders.
     
A flexible and result-oriented governance structure will be created for steering and guiding the implementation of the Mission, which was cleared by the Union Cabinet last week, the document stated.
     
Accordingly, an Empowered Group (EG) chaired by the Cabinet Secretary and comprising Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India, NITI Aayog CEO, and secretaries of various ministries besides departments of scientific and industrial research, promotion of industry and internal trade, and experts from the industry will be set up, it said.
     
The EG will oversee the mission activities, provide guidance, continuously monitor progress, recommend policy interventions to be made in furtherance of mission objectives and approve mid-course corrections if required.
     
A National Green Hydrogen Advisory Group comprising experts from academic and research institutions, industry, and civil society will also be constituted to advise the EG on all science and technology related matters pertaining to the Mission.
     
It will carry out technology gap analysis for various aspects of the value chain and accordingly define broad performance and cost targets based on global benchmarking.
     
The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) will be the nodal coordinating ministry for the Mission and will undertake the overarching policy formulation and programme implementation with an aim to scale up production of green hydrogen, green ammonia and other derivatives and enable cost reduction.         The government has also identified several risk factors which will be dealt with timely action through necessary policy changes to make the National Green Hydrogen Mission a success, it said.
     
"The success in achieving the outcomes of this mission is dependent on several factors. It will require constant monitoring, indexing, and sufficient flexibility for mid-course corrections. The underlying governance framework will be tasked with risk identification, classification and timely-action through necessary policy changes," according to the mission document.
     
The mission seeks to minimise various risks through an appropriate mix of financial and non-financial levers, and review mechanisms. These will be monitored regularly by the mission secretariat through regular consultations with stakeholders.
     
"An indicative categorization and associated management/mitigation measures for the likely risks are detailed (mission in the document)," it said.
     
Strategic risks like supply chain disruptions in critical inputs will be dealt with measures like diversification in supply chains.
     
Diversification of technology options, funding of multiple R&D and pilot threads, besides collaborative platforms for industry, academia and startups will be prepared to deal with technology disruptions and unforeseen developments.
     
Steps will also be taken to mitigate operational/project level risks involving water availability, land availability and safety concerns.
     
The government will take measures like demand creation in identified sectors, planning of RE capacity addition, and "risk sharing framework in procurement, facilitating projects to access FDI, bond markets, MFAs" to avert financial and market risks.