US Hydrogen Policy: Paving the Way for Energy Independence, Technology Leadership, and Decarbonization

The U.S. is a key player in the current hydrogen economy and holds substantial geo-economic potential to shape the global clean hydrogen market. The U.S. hydrogen strategy has been shaped by the ambition to balance (a) energy independence (b) the fight against climate change, and (c) expanding technology leadership. The landmark legislative packages of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (2021) and the Inflation Reduction Act (2022) reflect these priorities and include large-scale investments and financial incentives to promote the supply of clean hydrogen at lower costs, to strengthen innovation, and domestic value chains. The U.S. has been pioneering policy instruments for scaling up domestic clean hydrogen production and use cases across multiple sectors, which raised significant interest among policymakers and industrial actors worldwide. However, following President Trump’s re-election, policy uncertainty surrounding the future of the U.S. hydrogen sector has grown, although blue hydrogen may be in a more secure position than green. The international dimension of the U.S. hydrogen strategy has received much less attention in the U.S. policy debate and is less defined. Nevertheless, the U.S. has fostered bilateral partnerships on hydrogen and strengthened its hydrogen-related engagement in international organizations and multilateral initiatives in the past five years. Emerging priorities for the United States’ international collaboration on hydrogen include international demand creation and management, upscaling investments, international research collaborations, and joint efforts on regulation, standards, and certification. These efforts can be seen as the first steps toward the U.S. long-term goal to export hydrogen and related technologies to regional and global partners from the 2030s onwards.