As the EU signs a new green hydrogen deal with South Africa, groups call out the devastating impacts of the bloc’s neocolonial import plans. The Observatory of Debt in Globalisation is part of the 134 civil society organisations demanding that the EU scrap green hydrogen import targets.
A week after the EU signed its first Clean Trade and Investment Partnership with South Africa, focusing on green hydrogen and critical minerals, 134 civil society organisations from across the globe are calling on the EU and its Member States to scrap their neocolonial green hydrogen import plans.
The EU intends to import 10 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030 from countries like South Africa, Chile, and Namibia. However, in an open letter released today, groups warn that the plan replicates the injustices of the fossil fuel era, sacrificing communities in the Global South for Europe’s decarbonisation goals.
According to the letter, the EU’s scramble for hydrogen will have devastating consequences for communities wherever it takes place. Large-scale, export-oriented hydrogen projects require vast amounts of land and water, leading to widespread land and water grabbing, often without the free, prior, and informed consent of local communities.
Yegeshni Moodley, Climate and Energy Campaigner at groundWork and one of the co-authors of the open letter, said: “Europe’s hydrogen plans reek of green colonialism, offering little tangible benefit to host countries like South Africa, robbing communities of their available resources to transition to clean, safe energy.”
These impacts are laid out in a new documentary by Corporate Europe Observatory, premiering in Brussels on 27 November, which features interviews with South African communities on the front lines of proposed hydrogen projects.
While the EU talks about green hydrogen made from renewable electricity, campaigners also fear that it is a Trojan horse for hydrogen made from fossil fuels, as there will not be enough green electricity to make hydrogen and decarbonise the economy.
Pascoe Sabido, Researcher and Campaigner at Corporate Europe Observatory and one of the co-authors of the open letter, said: “The EU wants to import vast quantities of green hydrogen to decarbonise its own economy, but it has utterly ignored the voices of those directly impacted by the projects. It needs to scrap its unrealistic plans and start listening to frontline communities rather than the hydrogen lobby, which is little more than the fossil fuel industry in disguise.”
Tell the EU: No to Green Hydrogen Imports
134 civil society organisations call on European leaders to scrap the EU Commission’s target of importing 10 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030 and end all financial support for green hydrogen imports. Instead, EU governments must meet their climate goals through domestic efforts and by rapidly phasing out fossil fuels.
The European Union wants to import 10 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030, targeting countries such as Chile, Colombia, Morocco, Namibia, Tunisia, and South Africa. This goal, aggressively pushed by corporate and fossil fuel industry interests and their lobby groups, is not only unrealistic. It is unjust, inefficient, and rooted in a neocolonial model that prioritises flawed European energy agendas over the rights, needs, and futures of communities in the Global South. And despite the promise to increase European energy security, shifting from one imported commodity to another will only deepen Europe’s energy reliance on its peripheries. The EU cannot claim to lead a green and just transition while advancing energy colonialism abroad.
More than 80 groups from Africa, Europe and the world already said no to the SoutH2 Corridor, intended to transport hydrogen from North Africa to Germany. They recognised the problem was not limited to one pipeline, exposing the flaws of large scale, export oriented hydrogen production projects and calling for governments to “stop investing in large scale hydrogen production and transport projects that are blocking the construction of a just energy model for communities across Europe and Africa.” Nor is the problem limited to one continent.
Wherever it takes place, large-scale production of green hydrogen requires enormous amounts of land, water, and renewable energy. For producing countries, this means displacing communities, grabbing land, overexploiting scarce water sources, and redirecting renewable energy that could be used for local development. All of this is done in the name of meeting Europe’s decarbonisation targets, while offering little to no benefit to the people on the ground. If green hydrogen is to be developed, it should be for local use, not European factories, but renewable energy must first and foremost be used to meet local needs and rights, not as a commodity to be extracted and shipped abroad. Europe cannot transition its own economy on the backs of those in the Global South.
Why We Say No to Green Hydrogen Imports
Impacts on producing countries’ communities
- Land and water grabbing: export-driven hydrogen projects require vast amounts of land and water, often acquired through dispossession of local communities with no free, prior, and informed consent.
- Access to energy: renewable energy infrastructure is being built not for local benefit, but for European markets, while local populations often lack adequate access to energy.
- No local decent jobs or real development: despite the promises of governments and big companies, these projects will create few employment opportunities and fail to significantly contribute to local economies, while simultaneously destroying existing livelihoods.
A neocolonial and extractivist model
- Not a just transition: these imports reflect a continuation of extractivist practices, where natural resources are taken from the Global South to power the economies of the Global North, while the social, environmental and economic costs are left behind.
- All European: most of the companies involved will be European, the technology European, the consumers European, and therefore the profits also “European”, going straight into the pockets of a few large multinational corporations.
- Debt and risk on producing countries: Donor countries provide mainly loans and guarantees for European corporations and banks, while governments in producing countries are expected to use public funds to provide the counter-guarantees needed to de-risk private investments, pushing debt burdens onto already struggling public finances of governments in the Global South.
Sustaining a fossil fuel economy
- Trojan horse for fossil fuels: oil and gas companies publicly promote green hydrogen while privately ensuring fossil hydrogen is considered “clean” and “low carbon”, prolonging the extraction of gas and locking-in failed technologies like carbon capture and storage (CCS).
- Business as usual for big polluters: fossil fuel-reliant polluters like ArcelorMittal have used the promise of green hydrogen tomorrow to continue with business as usual today.
- Prolongs fossil fuel infrastructure: so-called “hydrogen-ready” infrastructure is being used to transport, store and burn fossil gas, which is likely to continue for the foreseeable future.
- Delays the transition: instead of rapidly phasing out coal, oil and gas and investing in local, democratic publicly-owned renewable energy systems, the EU is keeping fossil fuel corporations in control.
Economic nonsense
- Expensive and inefficient: producing and exporting green hydrogen over long distances is economically unviable. It requires enormous subsidies and infrastructure costs.
- Paid by taxpayers and local communities: European taxpayers will subsidise hydrogen imports while being exposed to increasing energy insecurity and climate disasters. In the Global South, communities pay through land loss, water stress, and long-term debt. Meanwhile large corporations profit on both sides.
We call on the European Union and its Member States to:
- Scrap the target of 10 million tonnes of green hydrogen imports by 2030 and commit to meeting national climate goals through domestic efforts and rapidly phasing out fossil fuels.
- End all public subsidies and financial support for green hydrogen import infrastructure and export-oriented hydrogen production projects abroad.
- Support countries in the Global South with their own just transitions, rooted in sustainability, social justice and ensuring local energy democracy. The same big polluters that caused the climate crisis should be paying for it.
The EU must not pursue a green transition that replicates the injustices of the fossil fuel era. Green hydrogen imports are a false solution that serve corporate agendas while deepening global inequality. They should not be at the heart of free trade deals, energy partnerships or clean trade and investment partnerships. A truly just energy transition is global in scale, not European, and it must centre people and communities, not corporate profits. We demand an energy future rooted in climate justice and equity for all.
No to green hydrogen imports. No to energy colonialism. Yes to just energy models for communities in the Global South, in Europe and everywhere.
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