Hydrogen Council CEO: Industry’s asks are the same, but the politics aren’t

Four years after Europe’s gas crisis accelerated hydrogen ambitions, the industry is still asking governments for many of the same things. Demand guarantees, faster permitting, regulatory certainty, and public market intervention remain at the centre of calls for support.

In light of the current Middle East conflict, however, what may be changing is the context around those requests, Hydrogen Council CEO Ivana Jemelkova told H2 View.

“The starting point of the conversation has evolved,” Jemelkova said. “It’s really all about the impacts of the succession of crises. We hit the wall time and time again, so maybe when we hit the wall for the third time, we can start thinking about things a little differently.”

Despite the more urgent geopolitical backdrop and growing visibility of projects under construction, the sector remains heavily dependent on policy execution to create commercially viable demand at scale.

Not just PowerPoint projects

For the Hydrogen Council, the clearest evidence of progress is no longer strategy documents, but visible infrastructure deployment.

During the World Hydrogen Summit in Rotterdam, Jemelkova said there had been a clear shift in discussion from previous editions dominated by long-term ambitions and conceptual project pipelines.

“It used to be potential ideas…and the conversation was so very different this time around,” she said. “It was panel after panel with companies that were saying, ‘we’re building, we’re doing it, we’ve got a project in construction, it’s coming online’.”

Much of the summit’s focus centred on projects under construction rather than future ambitions. Shell’s 200MW Holland Hydrogen I project, the 2.2GW Neom green hydrogen development in Saudi Arabia, and newly commissioned pipeline infrastructure were all highlighted as evidence that parts of the sector are beginning to move beyond the industry’s earlier phase.

While projects progressing through final investment decision (FID) and construction remain a minority of the global project pipeline according to DNV’s latest report, Jemelkova said sector-wide proof points were beginning to materialise.

Compared to 2022, “the number of projects past FID…has gone up tremendously,” she said. “Things have moved, some eyes have been opened, and some action has been taken.”

Argument hasn’t changed – the politics might have

Energy security has long sat alongside decarbonisation in hydrogen’s pitch to policymakers, Jemelkova argued. But she said repeated geopolitical shocks had altered how governments were responding to that message.

Amid escalating tensions around Iran and disruption to energy markets, the Hydrogen Council CEO said policymakers were increasingly focused on accelerating electrification, diversifying imports, and reducing exposure to concentrated supply routes.

During a fireside chat with Jemelkova at the event, IEA Director of Energy Markets and Security, Keisuke Sadamori, said the crisis would “redraw” global energy systems in a way not seen since the oil crisis in the 1970s.

The Strait of Hormuz, which handles roughly a fifth of global oil trade and a major share of Gulf LNG exports, has become a focal point for those concerns, raising fears over energy prices, industrial supply chains and fertiliser markets.

“This is really serious,” Jemelkova told H2 View. “This is really about rethinking how we do energy.”

The Council recently issued a call to action to governments, urging nations to accelerate hydrogen deployment to support energy and industrial resilience.

It argued that hydrogen can help diversify energy imports, strengthen industrial supply chains, and reduce exposure to volatile fossil fuel markets.

“We all understand how hydrogen can help,” she said. “The case for hydrogen has never been clearer, but now we need to shift gears to actually get built on that first wave, take the proofs, and turn them into the next wave and the next chapter for hydrogen.”

The Council estimates the first two months of the crisis have cost importing countries over $100bn, and argues investing in technology diversification would help economies less impacted by such shocks.

Delivery still depends on policy

While Jemelkova argued hydrogen has never made more sense politically, the commercial picture remains far less resolved. The interview also highlighted how dependent the sector remains on state-led market formation.

The call to action reiterated long-running calls for support across demand creation and investment in production, storage, and transportation infrastructure.

The Hydrogen Council boss said while strategies and policies may be ready “on paper,” they haven’t yet been translated.

“When it feels like we’re asking some of the same things, it’s simply because they have not yet been completed,” she said.

Implementation gaps remain across critical markets for hydrogen. In Europe, only a handful of countries have transposed EU green hydrogen mandates. In Asia, key auctions have been slow to develop.

Jemelkova argued policymakers need to “think more creatively” about demand activation, whether through public procurement mandates or lead markets.

“There are ways countries could really help, and that are not subsidies,” she said. “I think it’s really important that we explore those avenues…targets, mandates, big markets, public procurement, red tape removals, that can happen now to just get the molecules flowing.”

For all the industry’s talk of progress, the underlying challenge remains familiar: hydrogen still depends on governments turning long-discussed policy frameworks into real demand.

What has changed in 2026 is not the industry’s asks, but its belief that governments may finally be forced to act on them.