Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly chaired the first meeting of the National Green Hydrogen Council to present the executive status of green hydrogen projects.
At the beginning of the meeting, Madbouly explained that the establishment of the National Green Hydrogen Council comes within the framework of the state’s efforts to localize this promising industry, and in implementation of the directives of President Abdel Fattah El Sisi to establish an institutional entity responsible for management and coordination.
Madbouly stated that through this council, a rapid mechanism will be created to approve green hydrogen projects, adding that it is scheduled, soon, to launch the national strategy for green hydrogen.
During the meeting, Randa Al-Minshawi, First Assistant to the Prime Minister and Head of the Technical Secretariat of the National Green Hydrogen Council, reviewed the executive status of the green hydrogen projects file; in terms of production capabilities and investment costs for these projects, as well as the current status of the framework agreements that were signed during the climate conference held in Sharm El-Sheikh last November. Al-Minshawi also reviewed the most prominent efforts implemented to localize the green hydrogen industry in Egypt, in addition to presenting the results of the first meeting of the “Technical Secretariat of the National Council for Green Hydrogen.”
Regarding the current status of the framework agreements, Al-Minshawi explained, in her presentation, that nine agreements were transformed from memoranda of understanding into binding and enforceable framework agreements.
Al-Minshawi stated that it is expected that these signed projects will have many economic benefits on the Egyptian economy. Among them: consolidating Egypt’s position as a regional and global source of energy and green fuel, increasing the volume of exports, establishing electricity generation plants from renewable sources with a capacity of more than 44 gigawatts, and producing green fuel with a total capacity of more than 12 million tons annually, as well reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 37 million tons annually, creating more than 222,000 job opportunities during development and construction, and more than 44,000 permanent jobs in operations.
Al-Minshawi explained that the proposed investment incentives include: granting a cash investment incentive of no less than 33% and no more than 55% of the value of the tax paid, and exempting equipment, tools, machines, appliances, raw materials, supplies, and means of transportation, other than passenger cars, from value-added tax. Moreover, the public treasury bears the real estate tax due on the buildings of these projects, as well as the stamp tax and documentation fees for establishing companies, and finally obtains a single approval for the project company in accordance with the Investment Law and its executive regulations, while allowing the project company to import on its own or through others.
The results of the first meeting of the Technical Secretariat of the National Green Hydrogen Council included an emphasis on the speedy completion of the approval of the final version of the National Green Hydrogen Strategy to be presented to the National Green Hydrogen Council, and the study of granting an additional package of incentives.
The meeting was attended by Tarek El Molla, Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources; Mohamed Shaker, Minister of Electricity and Renewable Energy; Omar Marwan, Minister of Justice; Mohamed Maait, Minister of Finance, Yasmine Fouad, Minister of Environment; Assem El-Gazzar, Minister of Housing, Utilities and Urban Communities; Kamel Al-Wazir, Minister of Transport; Mohamed Salah El-Din, Minister of State for Military Production; Hani Sweilem, Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation; Mahmoud Esmat, Minister of Public Business Sector; and Ahmed Samir, Minister of Trade and Industry.
