Maarten Wetselaar, the CEO of the oil business Cepsa, has urged the European Union (EU) to give green hydrogen regulation first priority when modernizing the continent’s energy infrastructure. This would improve security and energy independence.

Wetselaar agrees that immediate action must be taken to “promote energy savings and supply assurance,” without ignoring the need for longer-term actions to hasten the adoption of new technologies.

He emphasized that the high energy costs brought on by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine may favor alternative technologies, such as green hydrogen, in order for them to be competitive and enable the growth of new sectors with affordable and sustainable energy by the decade’s end.

In this regard, he has requested that new renewable energy production for domestic use in Europe be encouraged rather than the development of new liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects, the start-up of which can take up to six years.