A Green Industrial Zone worth $500 million is planned to be built in the city of Bucha near Kyiv. The Ukrainian-Polish-Japanese project was announced in May 2023, but it is still at the initial stage of preparatory work, Pulz Biznesu reports.
The project involves the creation of an energy cluster for the production of green hydrogen and its processing into ammonia, which will provide jobs for 3,000 people.
Hydrogen is considered a green energy source if it is produced from ordinary water by electrolysis, and electricity is obtained from green sources: wind, sun, biomass.
The project participants are the Ukrainian engineering company UTEM (Pivdenteploenergomontazh), the Japanese Tsubame, and the Polish Hynfra, which is implementing a similar project in the Polish town of Sanok near Przemyśl.
Currently, the project is in the documentation collection and technical-economic justification development phase, meaning it is still in the planning and funding search stage. Actual construction has not yet begun. A key issue at this stage is reaching an agreement with the government in Tokyo, which will finance the technical documentation refinement. Following this, the consortium will submit an application to secure funds for the project's implementation. Funding is expected to come from the Japanese government and international financial institutions.
Despite the slow start, the project leadership remains optimistic about its realization.
"The Green Industrial Zone in Bucha will definitely be built. We would very much like the project to be operational by 2029. However, wartime conditions may delay this date," said Tomoho Umeda, President and Founder of Hynfra.
The success of the project will also depend on the availability of cheap energy, for which Ukraine has good prerequisites due to its nuclear energy and renewable energy potential.
In October 2023, the state-owned company Ukrhydroenergo signed a memorandum with the German company Andritz Hydro for the production of green hydrogen at hydroelectric power plants.
