CBAM-covered on one side, actively building export capacity for Europe on the other.
Book a 30-minute callThis is one of the few sectors on this list where India is actively building capacity aimed directly at the European market rather than reacting to European regulation. The Kakinada green hydrogen hub alone targets 1.5 million tonnes of ammonia production annually earmarked for European buyers, one project among a national buildout explicitly designed around export demand, not just domestic decarbonisation.
Hydrogen and electricity sit inside CBAM's scope from 1 January 2026, priced the same way as metals, against embedded emissions at the prevailing quarterly certificate rate. For Indian producers exporting green ammonia or hydrogen derivatives, the practical opportunity is that low-carbon production sidesteps most of the certificate cost by design, this is the one CBAM sector where compliance and competitive advantage point in the same direction rather than opposite ones.
Green hydrogen production falls under the National Green Hydrogen Mission's incentive and certification framework, including the SIGHT scheme's viability gap funding mechanisms for blending mandates.
CBAM applies to hydrogen and electricity from 1 January 2026 on the same embedded-emissions basis as the other four covered sectors, though genuinely low-carbon hydrogen production carries a structurally lower certificate cost than fossil-derived alternatives, the commercial logic behind projects like Kakinada.