Despite, or perhaps because of, the COVID-19 pandemic, the cleantech market saw significant focus in 2020, spurred also by renewed EU policy focus under the Green Deal and the victory of Joe Biden in the US Presidential Election. Of the cleantech themes which performed best, hydrogen was prominent (see page 9). The global surge of interest in the hydrogen economy was, in our view, an important feature of the energy transition in 2020.

Government support Policymakers around the world have shown rapidly increasing levels of commitment to the hydrogen economy. As we enter the 2020s, and many countries ramp up efforts to meet Paris Agreement pledges or set pathways towards net-zero emissions target dates (The climate in 2021, 5 January 2021), the build-out of hydrogen production and usage is increasingly being explored as a focus for decarbonising sectors across economies.

Companies drive the pace Companies in many sectors made pledges to build out low-emissions hydrogen production projects. Furthermore, commitments were also made to hydrogen infrastructure and the technologies which consume energy. We think the activity across upstream, midstream and downstream sectors of the valuechain is truly supportive of this theme.

Multi-sector innovation To meet the ambition of policy-makers and companies,technological innovation continues at companies and institutions around the world,including in as-yet-uncommercialised areas such as production from seawater,waste-to-hydrogen and applications in ships, trains, aviation, homes and industry.HSBC Global Research published a number of notes on hydrogen last year, which kicked off with Global hydrogen: Why the journey from grey to green is taking off?, 30 January 2020, and, in subsequent months, spoke with over-100 investors across global markets on this theme. Now, in advance of our Global Investment Seminar (25-28 January, see registration link adjacent right to register), we are returning to the theme. In this note, we track key developments since our global marketing push,from June through to December 2020. Meanwhile, we have also published these other notes on the theme today:

1. Hydrogen electrolysers, 13 January 2021

2. Global hydrogen: 2020s are the roaring decade of hydrogen, 13 January 2021