China is today redefining the global competitiveness of green hydrogen and green molecules more generally. It stands out as the only integrated hydrogen economy, even if it is sometimes misunderstood.
Yuki Yu of the Hong Kong-based consultancy Energy Iceberg presented to delegates at gasworld’s Asia-Pacific Industrial Gas Conference 2025 and offered this perspective on China alongside some eye-catching numbers on its evolving story.
She said Energy Iceberg’s researched showed that today there are more than 900 green hydrogen projects in development in China, with about 650 actively moving forward, and more than 200 electrolyser OEMs active. Alongside this, there are more than 320 Chinese developers in the green hydrogen market, as well as more than 100 electrofuels projects underway.
“China is changing the landscape in green molecules,” said Yu. “This is underpinned by the largest and cheapest renewables resources, by world-leading electrotech and manufacturing capability, and by the largest demand side as well – from industries like petrochemicals, chemicals, metallurgy, and building materials.”
Yu said it is not all plain sailing for China and green hydrogen, however. While a level of maturity has been attained, and a certain amount of demand is there, a gap remains when it comes to offtake agreements being signed.
“Downstream offtake remains critical to delivering the success of China’s green hydrogen and green fuels ambitions,” said Yu. “Domestic policies can stimulate some demand, but execution remains in doubt, partly because international mechanisms to drive demand from Europe or the US have not so far delivered as hoped.
“As it stands, without much stronger policy signals or a significant cost decline, it will remain hard for green hydrogen and green fuels to scale,” said Yu. “Within China, some new state-level incentives should drive further demand from heavy industry and even from new decarbonising technologies, but the wider picture is that international demand is not coming through as hoped.”
Yu said some kind of tipping point still remained to be achieved, but the timelines for green hydrogen’s delivery had for now been pushed out – probably more towards the 2040. For the wider Asia-Pacific region, this reality means that a rethink is probably needed when it comes to green hydrogen and how to approach the opportunity.