Climate Policy Engagement Analysis
Climate Lobbying Overview: The Clean Hydrogen Future Coalition (CHFC) is highly engaged on specific policy in the United States relating to the energy transition, specifically the development of hydrogen production and use. The association broadly supports “clean hydrogen” while consistently advocating for less stringent requirements for its production. CHFC’s members include major oil and gas producers, utilities, and fossil gas trade groups, including ExxonMobil, Duke Energy, and the American Gas Association, alongside several hydrogen producers.
Top-line Messaging on Climate Policy: CHFC has limited top-line messaging on climate policy. The organization’s main website references modeling by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and appears to support limiting warming to 2ºC. Also on its website, CHFC expresses support for government regulation to help grow the hydrogen industry, but primarily supports “technology-neutral” hydrogen policies, which include hydrogen produced from fossil fuels. The Clean Hydrogen Future Coalition has not explicitly supported the Paris Agreement or called for government regulation to respond to climate change beyond regulatory support for hydrogen production.
Engagement with Climate-Related Regulations: The Clean Hydrogen Future Coalition has extremely limited engagement with climate-related regulations. InfluenceMap was unable to find evidence of positions on, or engagement with, climate-related regulations other than those related to the energy transition.
Positioning on Energy Transition: CHFC’s engagement with the energy transition is mostly negative, consistently supporting policy which promotes clean hydrogen production with major exceptions. In its non-policy-specific messaging, CHFC holds mixed positions. For example, in CHFC’s media kit, accessed in June 2024, the organization’s President and CEO, Shannon Angielski, supported clean hydrogen for use in all sectors, including electricity generation, heavy-duty transport, and hard-to-decarbonize heavy industry. In a statement in support of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, CHFC supported the policy’s technology-neutral approach to hydrogen production.
CHFC engaged heavily on the Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) Section 45V hydrogen tax credit. Its comments consistently advocate for a weakening of the “three pillars” of hydrogen policy: additionality, regionality, and time matching. In March 2024 testimony to the IRS, the association opposed the use of the three pillars. CHFC’s President, Shannon Angielski, gave spoken testimony to the IRS in November 2023 on the implementation of the IRA, supporting the hydrogen tax credit while opposing strict implementation of all three pillars until 2030. In the same testimony, Angielski appeared to support the continued use of fossil fuels, stating that for the US to achieve a fully operational hydrogen infrastructure, it would “need the natural gas industry.” In a December 2022 comment to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), CHFC strongly opposed additionality and advocated for weaker time matching requirements.
CHFC appears to broadly support policy which supports fossil gas and hydrogen produced from fossil gas. The organization submitted comments on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed power plant rules in 2023, opposing the ambition of the proposed timeline for the hydrogen co-firing in fossil gas-fired power plants, thus advocating for the extension of fossil gas use in power plants. CHFC also submitted comments on the EPA’s Renewable Fuel Program Standards for 2023-2025, advocating for a broad definition of various types of hydrogen produced from biogas to allow more hydrogen production pathways to qualify under the standard.
InfluenceMap collects and assesses evidence of corporate climate policy engagement on a weekly basis, depending on the availability of information from each specific data source (for more information see our methodology). While this analysis flows through to the company’s scores each week, the summary above is updated periodically. This summary was last updated in Q3 2024.