Tata arm eyes green hydrogen for growth push
Engineering company Tata Projects is training its sights on the green hydrogen market, as the need for non-fossil fuel sources gathers pace in the country.
In a conversation with Business Standard, Vinayak Pai, managing director (MD), Tata Projects, said, the company is building capabilities to provide engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) solutions to green hydrogen plants.
“We have the skill sets available to us to deal with hydrogen and its unit operations. We will not deploy our own capital in green hydrogen. Instead, we will work with customers who are ready to put in their capital on these projects. We will focus on providing EPC solutions for green hydrogen plants,” he said.
Rival Larsen & Toubro (L&T) has taken a different approach to the green hydrogen market, focusing on all ends-of-the-value-chain.
It is from producing the fuel to manufacturing critical components such as electrolysers and advanced cell batteries to undertaking EPC projects for customers in the space.
L&T plans to spend ~20,000 crore on green energy projects, including green hydrogen over the next 3-4 years. It has also entered into a joint venture (JV) with Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) to set up electrolysers, a key component. And, it has a separate JV with IOC and Renew Power for the green fuel. In August, L&T set up its first green hydrogen plant at Hazira, Gujarat. The unit is capable of producing 45 kg of the fuel per day, at an investment of ~25 crore.
Learnings from this plant are expected to be deployed on cement, steel and oil & gas projects that are keen to use the green fuel for operations, L&T said.
On the other hand, Tata Projects will work closely with electrolyser technology manufacturers on green hydrogen projects,
Pai said. Tata Power, which has a major shareholding in Tata Projects, is expected to support the latter in its effort to tap green hydrogen, he said. “As a Tata group company, we are well positioned because we have Tata Power, which is installing a high number of renewable energy projects. And that, combined with our EPC capabilities to deliver hydrogen solutions will be a strong attraction for the market,” Pai said. Apart from Tata Projects and L&T, groups such as Adani, Reliance Industries (RIL) and Greenko have announced their forays into the green hydrogen sector recently.
In July, France’s Totalenergies SE and the Adani Group agreed to invest $50 billion over the next 10 years in India to produce green hydrogen and develop an ecosystem around it. As part of the plan, Totalenergies would buy 25 per cent in a new clean energy company, Adani New Industries (ANIL), a unit of Adani Enterprises.
WE WILL NOT DEPLOY OUR OWN CAPITAL IN GREEN HYDROGEN. INSTEAD, WE WILL WORK WITH CUSTOMERS READY TO PUT IN THEIR CAPITAL”