The Micro, Small and Medium-scale industries (MSMEs) in Coimbatore district will explore with Japanese collaboration opportunities in green hydrogen sector.

P. Ponram, vice-president of the Coimbatore District Small Industries Association, told The Hindu that the association has held talks with H2 Innovation that is looking for partners in Tamil Nadu for manufacture and market of green hydrogen fuel cells. “We will visit Japan in October and continue our discussions,” he said.

Green hydrogen is a promising sector that the MSMEs can benefit from as producers and consumers. India already has green hydrogen buses. Hence, the association will see how the MSMEs can be involved in this sector, he said.

Karunanidhi Kasinathan, founder and chairman of K-KCCS India Private Limited (an Indo-Japan bridge organisation), told The Hindu that KCCS in association with H2 Innovation Co. Ltd., Japan, is facilitating a series of initiatives to promote collaboration between Japanese technology companies, Indian industries, and educational institutions in green hydrogen, renewable energy, and decarbonisation.

“We are signing tri-partite Memoranda of Understanding with five educational institutions in Tamil Nadu to promote research in green hydrogen and make it cost competitive for the Indian market,” he said.

With high labour and land costs, Japan is looking at technology transfer to expand quickly production of green hydrogen fuel cells. “We are looking for industry partners to take to manufacture and take to market the green hydrogen fuel cells,” he said.

Yosuke Mori, Representative Director of H2 Innovation, added that the capacity can range from 100 KW to 1 MW. “We have done 150 installations in Japan of varying capacity from 500 watts to 50 KW each. We are in discussion with investors in India,” he said.

Initially, about 30 % of the fuel cell can be made in India and the special cylinders will come from Japan. When the manufacturing eco system develops in India the entire cell can be made here, he said.

The minimum investment required to set up a plant here will be ₹20 crore to ₹25 crore. Customers who are mandated to use green hydrogen by the Indian government will be targeted customers initially. . The Union government is mandating all data centres to be powered by renewable energy. For them these fuel cells will be an ideal option and the large data centre investors will not mind spending higher amount to go for clean energy. There are plans to hold talks in all the southern States for this project, he said.