What’s next for hydrogen in 2025?
CRA contributors: Dieter Keller-Giessbach (Vice President CRA Energy Europe), Richard Acklam (Associate Principal CRA Energy Europe), Cosima Sagmeister (Associate CRA Energy Europe)
For the clean hydrogen industry, 2024 was a year of revising expectations to reflect greater realism while moving from forecasting and planning to implementation of projects. That’s overall positive as it helps to understand where efforts should be concentrated and provides certainty to investors and project developers.
Compared to 2024, this year, we expect less regulatory uncertainty and in particular more clarity regarding public support mechanisms, which creates space for additional private financing flowing into the industry and more projects taking FiD. We will closely monitor the following aspects that we believe will shape the outlook for the hydrogen industry:
Firstly, German clean hydrogen policy and supporting frameworks post-2025 elections. Germany remains one of the key drivers of European hydrogen ambition. In 2024, some German industry players revised their timelines and cost estimates of major projects, shedding light on some of the complex challenges the industry is still facing. The new government’s strategy to handle these bottlenecks will critically influence where clean hydrogen will go in Europe this year.
We’ll also be tracking US policy and LNG developments. The US has a high potential to become a major export hub for clean hydrogen and its derivatives. The approach of the incoming administration will be determining in this context. Additionally, we’ll closely monitor how natural gas and LNG production, and export flows shape up in the early months of 2025, which will be a key indicator for the hydrogen industry.
Project progress is another key factor shaping the hydrogen industry. Tracking progress of concrete projects in the first months of 2025 is another focus element. Some important ones reached major milestones in 2024. Shell’s REFYNE II (100 MW) in Germany took FiD. Uniper chose an electrolyser manufacturer for their hydrogen project in Wilhelmshaven (200 MW), opting for a US supplier, who started pre-FEED work in October this year. While these projects are set to become fully operational later in the decade, closely observing how these larger-scale endeavours advance will be telling for the future of the industry.
READ the latest news shaping the hydrogen market at Hydrogen Central
What’s next for hydrogen in 2025?
