Oh No!! We're Doomed!! Australia's Fortescue Cancels Two Planned "Green" Hydrogen Projects, Blames Trump

The iron ore magnate Andrew Forrest’s Fortescue company has cancelled two major green hydrogen projects, laying some of the blame on the Trump administration’s shift away from renewable energy. Fortescue’s decision to cancel the two ventures in Queensland and Arizona are the latest in a run of canned hydrogen projects in Australia and elsewhere that will raise further questions about the future of the clean fuel.

Gus Pichot, the chief executive of growth and energy at Fortescue, said a “shift in policy priorities away from green energy” in the US had “changed the situation” for its reported US$550m green hydrogen production plans in Arizona. “The lack of certainty and a step back in green ambition has stopped the emerging green energy markets making it hard for previously feasible projects to proceed,” he said.

At the same time, Fortescue said it was cancelling its Gladstone PEM50 project in Queensland that had been slated to produce up to 8,000 tonnes of green hydrogen a year. Pichot said this was down to the company’s “strategic shift away from electrolysers to focus on advancing technologies to provide low cost hydrogen for green industry in Australia”.

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Simon Nicholas, a global steel sector analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, said: “There has clearly been way too much hype, and politicians and policies have been far too distracted by nonsensical uses of green hydrogen – things like household heating, or adding hydrogen into the gas distribution network, and electric vehicles are clearly winning the race [against hydrogen cell vehicles].” He said subsidies provided to the industry needed to be more targeted for green hydrogen for domestic use and for uses that “made more sense” such as in replacing hydrogen derived from gas used for fertilisers or in steel production.

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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/25/fortescue-cancels-green-hydrogen-projects-trump-us-policy-renewable-energy