Are African green hydrogen projects for Africans?

September’s Africa Green Hydrogen Summit in Cape Town brought announcements of new funding and projects, but questions remain about green hydrogen’s future.

The gas has the potential to replace fossil fuels and reduce emissions in hard-to-electrify sectors like steelmaking and shipping. African countries are interested both in exporting hydrogen and using it to achieve their own national energy transition targets.

Between 2017 and 2024, of the more than 50 countries and the EU that released hydrogen strategies, eight were African. The Economic Community of West African States also published one.

Much of this interest has in fact stemmed from Europe, which has placed green hydrogen imported from renewables-rich geographies at the centre of its net-zero plans. The 2022 RePowerEU Plan, for example, targets 10 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen to be imported per year by 2030.

This has given rise to claims of “green colonialism” and the formation of new relationships of extraction from the African continent for European benefit. Yet a number of African governments have enthusiastically promoted green hydrogen, and African research institutions started examining the industry’s potential years before the EU set its target.

“There is a high degree of government agency behind this in African countries,” said Alfonso Medinilla, head of climate action and green transition at the European Centre for Development Policy Management, a think-tank based in Maastricht and Brussels.

What is driving the green hydrogen hype in Africa? And could it offer genuine benefits to African economies?

The hydrogen economy

Hydrogen can fuel vehicles, industrial processes and power stations. The green variety is made by splitting water using renewable power via electrolysis. Hydrogen made using gas is known as grey hydrogen, and with coal, black hydrogen.

African countries, such as Morocco and Namibia, are well placed to make green hydrogen due to their abundant solar and wind resources. North African countries in particular enjoy proximity to one of the world’s largest hydrogen markets, Europe.

The continent has the potential to generate 1,000 terrawatts (TW) of solar and wind power, enough to produce more than 45,000 million tonnes of hydrogen per year, according to the International Energy Agency. An African green hydrogen economy could add up to USD 150 billion to the continent’s GDP by 2050, according to the African Green Hydrogen Report published by German developemnt agency GIZ in 2025.

Products made with the gas are already being used in Africa in various industrial applications such as steelmaking, fertiliser production and mining operations. That said, low-emission hydrogen production was equivalent to just 0.2% of the 3.1 million tonnes of hydrogen used on the continent in 2024.

‘Green colonialism’

Both African and European voices have raised concerns about European green hydrogen investments in Africa, with some using the term “green colonialism”. In a 2023 book produced by research and advocacy organisation the Transnational Institute, Hamza Hamouchene defines this as “the extension of the colonial relations of plunder and dispossession … to the green era of renewable energies, with the accompanying displacement of socio-environmental costs onto peripheral countries and communities, prioritising the energy needs of one region of the world over another.”

The socio-economic concerns relating to hydrogen production can include land acquisition, water stress the impacts of desalination, and the export-oriented focus of many European-supported projects.

Saber Ammar, a researcher at the Transnational Institute, tells Dialogue Earth that hydrogen won’t economically benefit producing countries.

“Technical innovation in developing novel electrolysers and related technologies is concentrated in Europe, North America and Asia,” according to a report on green hydrogen by the International Renewable Energy Agency.

Ammar fears that Tunisia will need to import expensive electrolysers and then export the hydrogen manufactured via them “with low added value”. Tunisia aims to produce 8.3 million tonnes of green hydrogen and its derivatives by 2050 of which 6 million tonnes would be for export.

North African countries including Morocco are well positioned to sell hydrogen to Europe, one of the world’s largest markets (Image: K M Krause / Imago / Alamy)

Other critiques say green hydrogen will divert investments from projects to generate renewable power for direct use on the continent. Global Energy Monitor, which maps international energy infrastructure, found that 61% of all prospective utility-scale wind and solar capacity in Africa is earmarked for green hydrogen, mostly for export to Europe.

Some 600 million people in Africa lack access to electricity. Insufficient energy supplies remain a barrier to economic development in many African countries. Among the continent’s major prospective green hydrogen producers, Namibia and Mauritania have electricity access rates of below 60%, according to World Bank figures.

However, the relationship between hydrogen production and electricity availability is not straightforward.

“If you take away the green hydrogen projects, they will not suddenly release a lot of clean energy to the grid because these projects are being developed with the clean power infrastructure directly linked to them,” says Medinilla of ECDPM.

In fact, to be classified as green, the EU requires green hydrogen to be produced from newly developed renewable energy sources, not existing energy capacity.

African agency

For some, the green colonialism narrative does not hold.

“It’s … not as simple as saying the Europeans are telling the Africans to produce green hydrogen for them at their own expense,” says Medinilla.

“[Governments] want to develop this not because they have been told by Europeans [but] because they see a very clear commercial opportunity in the sector.”

Nonetheless, “these concerns [of green colonialism] should not be dismissed outright,” Joseph Mukendwa, the acting head of the Namibian Green Hydrogen Programme, told Dialogue Earth.

“Given historical considerations, they reflect legitimate questions about ownership, benefit sharing, land use, environmental protection, and also local participation.”

There should be more transparency around how the sector is being built, he says. “The key question is not whether the products are exported, but whether Namibians actually get to meaningfully benefit from the industry.”

The benefits of green hydrogen for African economies

Green hydrogen does seem promising for some countries. Derivatives such as “green” ammonia present an opportunity for green industrialisation and sustainable agriculture. Kenya, for example, is looking into green fertiliser production to reduce import dependence.

Countries across the continent are dependent on fertiliser imports, risking food security during geopolitical tensions such as the ongoing Gulf crisis. If planned properly, experts argue that such projects could improve food security and benefit Kenya economically.

Additionally, exports of green hydrogen and its derivatives to high-demand markets such as the EU have been presented as an economic opportunity for producing countries. What follows is the question of how export revenues can be fairly shared within nations, an issue not unique to the hydrogen sector.

Green fertiliser production and hydrogen exports are just two of several opportunities for African countries in the green hydrogen economy. The possibilities for each country interested in green hydrogen can vary. Medinilla says: “We need to go a bit more in depth and have [clearer] propositions and proposals on how to make these sectors work for African economies and African industrialisation.”

“What level of specialisation in certain products can African countries realistically pursue and what are the industrial policy choices that [they] need to be able to position long term?”

Is green hydrogen stalling already?

There are some concerns that Africa’s hydrogen development may be stalling before it has a chance to convey its benefits. The IEA’s Global Hydrogen Review 2026 reports that within the 2030 project pipeline in Africa, only one of 31 projects has so far moved from planning to a firm commitment to build.

Mukendwa said that the Climate Investment Fund’s Industry Decarbonisation Programme has established an illustrative pipeline of 17 green industries projects in Namibia. Building them all would require USD 20 billion, more than the country’s GDP, demonstrating the complexity of the challenge.

Whether or not African green hydrogen projects will materialise and benefit African economies and societies remains uncertain.