The Industry and Trade Ministry is drafting a hydrogen production strategy and deploying gas power and offshore wind power projects. — Vietnam News
HANOI: The government should implement support policies to ensure the development and competitiveness of clean hydrogen sources in the country.
That is according to Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Sinh Nhat Tan, who said that hydrogen has been recognised as a clean and indispensable energy source in the energy structure of many countries to achieve the goal of carbon neutrality by 2050.
As of early 2023, more than 40 countries had issued national hydrogen strategies and major financial support policies to form and develop the hydrogen industry.
In particular, the European Union aims to produce green hydrogen to account for 13% to 14% of the bloc’s energy structure by 2050, while Japan and South Korea target developing clean hydrogen, including green hydrogen and blue hydrogen, respectively, to account for 10% and 33% of their national energy structures by 2050.
The Industry and Trade Ministry is drafting a hydrogen production strategy and deploying gas power and offshore wind power projects.
This is according to the Politburo’s Resolution No. 55-NQ/TW on the strategic orientation of Vietnam’s national energy development until 2030 with a vision to 2045 and Decision No 893/QD-TTg on the National Energy Master Plan for the 2021 to 2030 period with a vision to 2050.
Under the draft strategy, Vietnam will promote the development of hydrogen energy production and hydrogen-derived fuels and target hydrogen output of 100,000 to 500,000 tonnes by 2030 and 10 million to 20 million tonnes by 2050.
According to the Vietnam Petroleum Institute (VPI), the cost of producing clean hydrogen (including blue hydrogen and green hydrogen) until 2025 will still be high.
Specifically, the production costs of blue hydrogen and green hydrogen in Vietnam are still 1.3 and 2.1 times higher than grey hydrogen (hydrogen produced with fossil fuels such as natural gas or coal and accounts for about 95% of the world’s hydrogen production).
In Vietnam, the implementation of the government’s supportive policies is necessary to ensure the competitiveness of clean hydrogen sources.
These support policies for hydrogen development need to reduce risks to investors by including hydrogen in national energy planning to create a legal framework and priority list for hydrogen development projects and related fields.
In addition, support policies need to create demand for hydrogen in the national economy, such as financial support for infrastructure development projects serving the development of the hydrogen value chain and carbon dioxide tax applications to increase competitiveness for clean hydrogen.
With the advantage of its production network and supply chain in green hydrogen development, Vietnam Oil and Gas Group (PVN) has participated in the process of planning strategies and policies to create the necessary legal framework for the development of green hydrogen.
According to the general-director of PVN’s Vietnam Petroleum Technical Services Joint Stock Corp, Le Manh Cuong, the current cost of offshore wind power production in the world is still generally high.
However, building offshore wind farms associated with the synchronous development of green hydrogen production will be effective.
Therefore, besides the efforts of enterprises, the government needs to soon have a specific mechanism to develop offshore wind power and wind power associated with green hydrogen production.
In addition, for industries in which domestic enterprises have enough capacity to meet market requirements, the government should have specific regulations on production origin in Vietnam to qualify for incentives, which will contribute to supporting domestic enterprises to develop and improve capacity. — Viet Nam News/ANN
