Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what plans the Government has to support the development of hydrogen fuel cell gigafactories in the UK.

The UK has great strengths in electrochemical technologies, including hydrogen fuel cells. UK companies are already exporting fuel cells into global markets for use in transport as well as heat and power.

The UK fuel cell market is at an early stage of development and focus to date has been on supporting innovation and early deployment, mostly in transport, rather than mass production. The £23m Hydrogen for Transport Programme is funding the deployment of around 300 hydrogen vehicles and supporting infrastructure. The £2m FCEV Fleet Support Scheme is supporting public and private sector fleets to become early adopters of these vehicles. A total of four fuel cell innovation projects (total grant £2.2million) with UK industry have been funded through BEIS Energy Entrepreneurs Fund.

Investment in innovation, along with wider efforts to establish a domestic market for hydrogen and understand high value opportunities for UK technology deployment and exports will inform our future approach to UK manufacturing of hydrogen-related technologies including fuel cells.