Major developments in Asia, both at a symbolic and a practical level. As written by AP, the flame at Tokyo’s National Stadium and another cauldron burning along the waterfront near Tokyo Bay throughout the games will be sustained in part by hydrogen, the first time the fuel source will be used to power an Olympic fire.

On a more business-oriented level, the biggest oil and gas company in India entered the hydrogen stage.

“IndianOil has a wind power project in Rajasthan. We intend to wheel that power to our Mathura refinery to produce absolutely green hydrogen through electrolysis,” Chairman Shrikant Madhav Vaidy said (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) on Friday, commenting on the decision of the Indian government-owned oil and gas corporation to build India's first green hydrogen plant.

Germany's Uniper signed a cooperation agreement with Omani green hydrogen project Hyport.

Developments also in Europe.

An executive body of the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy has awarded a subsidy of 3.6 million euros to PosHYdon (Öffnet in neuem Fenster). The project in the North Sea is reportedly the world's first offshore green hydrogen pilot on a working platform.

Hydrogen projects are moving forward also in Greece (Öffnet in neuem Fenster), and Scotland (Öffnet in neuem Fenster), where BP and German offshore wind developer EnBW submitted their bid for offshore wind acreage in the ScotWind leasing round. Investments will include related hydrogen projects.

Research projects and collaboration agreements have been announced in the United Kingdom (Öffnet in neuem Fenster), and Italy (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

Finally, the transportation sector is signing collaboration agreements for hydrogen solutions and conversions: Iceland’s Icelandair (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) signed two Letters of Intent to decarbonize flying, TotalEnergies joined (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) OMV, Shell New Energies, Volvo Group, IVECO and Daimler Truck in the H2Accelerate.

Hyzon Motors developed (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) a “new onboard hydrogen storage system technology capable of reducing the weight and manufacturing cost of commercial vehicles powered by Hyzon’s hydrogen fuel cells”.

The European Commission approved (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) a €507.5 million German Federal scheme to acquire climate-friendly commercial vehicles that will apply until the end of 2024.

The past week in Brussels

The European Commission launched two new industrial alliances (Öffnet in neuem Fenster): the Processor and Semiconductor Alliance and the European Industrial Data Alliance (Link).

The European Commission has issued a call for all interested organizations to participate as members in a new offshore renewable energy working group (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) under the Clean Energy Industrial Forum. The deadline for applications is September 10, 2021.

EU ambassadors approved a tentative political agreement (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)reached with the European Parliament on July 12 on a proposal to revise the Aarhus Regulation. The regulation lays down the modalities for the implementation by the EU and its Member States of the International Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters.

Germany and the United States have reached an understanding on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, at the end of the German Chancellor's visit to the White House. The agreement struck by Angela Merkel and Joe Biden commits the two states to create a fund of at least $1 billion to support Ukraine's energy transition, to which Berlin will contribute an initial donation of at least $175 million.

The EU is requesting consultations with Russia in the World Trade Organization (WTO) (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) regarding certain Russian measures that restrict or prevent EU companies from selling goods and services to Russian State-owned enterprises and other entities through procurement for commercial purposes.

The European Investment Bank (EIB) and the International Solar Alliance have released a new study outlining solutions (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) to overcome the key economic and investment challenges holding back off-grid solar investment across Africa.

This week in Brussels

Informal videoconference of economy and finance ministers (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) today. The ministers will take stock of the implementation of the Recovery and Resilience Facility, with an exchange of views on the second package of Council implementing decisions on Member State plans.

The European Commission (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) has less than twenty appointments in total, one-tenth of a normal week. The focus will still be on agriculture and the Mediterranean. Several meetings in Italy and Cyprus.

For the rest, the next weeks should be relatively calm.