A Poonawalla-backed startup, a tech duo, a Jindal deal: green hydrogen goes unorthodox to cut costs

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Synopsis
The one key factor for green hydrogen to become mainstream is its high cost. A bunch of Indian startups have taken up the job to develop indigenous cost-efficient green hydrogen tech. But scalability will be a litmus test for them, as access to capital, value-chain bottlenecks and availability and retention of skilled workforce remain a challenge.

This one started a little before the pandemic. Adar Poonawalla and his Serum Institute of India (SII) were going about their usual work of producing vaccines for the world – from tetanus to influenza to measles to hepatitis B, and many more. No one had heard of Covid-19. Poonawalla could afford to explore the world outside SII labs before the grueling research to create Covishield took centre stage. Far beyond the walls of SII in Pune existed a