Japan’s HESC abandons plan to import from Australia

Supply chain project switches to domestically produced hydrogen amid concerns over timing of Australian development

The Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain (HESC) project, which initially planned to ship coal-derived blue hydrogen from Australia to Japan, will now source domestically produced hydrogen instead. Japan Suiso Energy (JSE)—a joint venture (JV) between Japanese multinational Kawasaki Heavy Industries and industrial gases company Iwatani Corporation, and a key partner in HESC—will now conduct its commercial demonstration phase entirely in Japan. “This change is to remain aligned with the condition of the Japanese Government Green Innovation Fund that the commercial demonstration phase must be completed by end of Japanese fiscal year 2030,” a spokesperson for HESC told Hydrogen Economist. “The com