The Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability (CSS) was published by the European Commission on 14 October 2020 as EU’s zero pollution ambition within the EU Green Deal. The EU already has sophisticated chemicals laws in place, but global chemicals production is expected to double by 2030. In this context, the CSS announces a Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda in 2022, from which a Strategic Research and Innovation Plan (SRIP) has been delivered.

The SRIP highlights current research and innovation areas crucial for accelerating the transition to chemicals and materials that are safe and sustainable, from production to (re)use, disposal and pollution remediation. This document is the result of extensive consultations with expert groups. The aim is to guide R&I stakeholders in their decisions on investments across the EU, national and private funding programmes and inviting them to contribute to its implementation. In addition, the SRIP will be used in Horizon Europe overarching strategy.

The European Commission has presented its Hydrogen Strategy, an strategic roadmap that provides a concrete policy framework within which the European Clean Hydrogen Alliance – building on the success of the European Battery Alliance – a collaboration between public authorities, industry and civil society, formally launched today, will develop an investment agenda and a pipeline of concrete projects. It complements the Strategy for Energy System Integration, presented at the same time, which describes how the ongoing work streams of EU energy policy, including hydrogen development, will foster a climate neutral integrated energy system with renewable electricity, circularity and renewable and low-carbon fuels at its core. Both strategies contribute towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals and the objectives of the Paris Agreement.

In the first phase, from 2020 up to 2024, the strategic objective is to install at least 6 GW of renewable hydrogen electrolysers in the EU and the production of up to 1 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen, to decarbonise existing hydrogen production, e.g. in the chemical sector and facilitating take up of hydrogen consumption in new end-use applications such as other industrial processes and possibly in heavy-duty transport.

In a second phase, from 2025 to 2030, hydrogen needs to become an intrinsic part of an integrated energy system with a strategic objective to install at least 40 GW of renewable hydrogen electrolysers by 2030 and the production of up to 10 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen in the EU.

In a third phase, from 2030 onwards and towards 2050, renewable hydrogen technologies should reach maturity and be deployed at large scale to reach all hard-todecarbonise sectors where other alternatives might not be feasible or have higher costs.