Lobbying efforts for Europe to transition to hydrogen as a fuel source are led by The Hydrogen Council. According to the new report, The Hydrogen Council was formed in 2017 with members including Europe’s top fossil fuel producers such as Aramco (Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company), Shell, BP, Toyota, Honda, Microsoft, Total and many others in the energy and transportation industries. According to the new report, FTI consulting was directly involved in setting up The Hydrogen Council and the contact address for the council is even the same as FTI’s Brussels headquarters.
While Shell is touting green hydrogen, this type of ad is considered greenwashing similar to Exxon promoting algae-based fuels. These are not viable economic solutions despite having the potential to achieve that status at some point in the future. Green hydrogen is currently expensive to produce and makes up only 0.1% of the existing hydrogen market in the European Union. Ads from big oil companies promoting green hydrogen are misleading the public about the industry plans for fossil fuel based hydrogen because green hydrogen is currently prohibitively expensive and no where near being able to scale up to be a major contributor to the near-term energy markets.