Indian government focuses on hydrogen-powered industry as the main pillar of its economic strategy stated on Thursday the top bureaucrat responsible for renewable energy.

The country will spend $200 million over the next five to seven years to promote the use of hydrogen, Mr. Indu Shekhar Chaturvedi, informed the highest official at India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy.

India has asked its state-run oil and gas companies to set up seven hydrogen pilot plants by the end of this financial year, India’s oil secretary Tarun Kapoor also said at the Hydrogen Economy – New Delhi Dialogue event.

Governments and energy companies around the world are betting on clean hydrogen playing a leading role in efforts to lower greenhouse gas emissions, though its future uses and costs remain uncertain.

Oil minister Mr. Dharmendra Pradhan revealed at the online conference the government planned to scale up use of hydrogen blended with compressed natural gas (H-CNG) as a transportation fuel.

We are looking forward to introducing H-CNG as an intermittent technology in a big way for both automotive and domestic cooking applications, Mr. Pradhan said on Thursday