The Strategic Road Map for Hydrogen and Fuel Cells: Industry-academia-government Action Plan to Realize a “Hydrogen Society”

The fourth Strategic Energy Plan adopted in April 2014 stated, ""a road map toward realization of a “hydrogen society” will be formulated, and a council which comprises representatives of industry, academia and government and which is responsible for its implementation will steadily implement necessary measures while progress is checked". Then, the Council for a Strategy for Hydrogen and Fuel Cells, which was held in June in the same year as a conference of experts from industry, academia and government, compiled a Strategic Roadmap for Hydrogen and Fuel Cells (hereinafter referred to as ""the Roadmap"") presenting efforts to be undertaken by concerned parties from the public/private sector aimed at building a hydrogen-based society.
The Roadmap was revised in March 2016 in response to the progress of the efforts to include the schedule and quantitative targets to make the fuel cells for household use (Ene-Farm), fuel cell vehicles (FCVs) and hydrogen stations self-reliant. In April 2017 the first Ministerial Council on Renewable Energy, Hydrogen and Related Issues was held. The Council decided to establish--by the end of the year--a basic strategy that would allow the government to press on with the measures in an integrated manner to realize a hydrogen-based society for the first time in the world. The second Ministerial Council on Renewable Energy, Hydrogen and Related Issues was then held in December of that year to establish the Basic Hydrogen Strategy. The Strategy was positioned as a policy through which the whole government would promote relevant measures and proposed that hydrogen be another new carbon-free energy option. By setting a target to be achieved by around 2030, the Strategy provides the general direction and vision that the public and private sectors should share with an eye on 2050.
Furthermore, the fifth Strategic Energy Plan was adopted in July 2018. In order for hydrogen to be available as another new energy option in addition to renewable energy, the Plan showed the correct direction of hydrogen energy in the energy policy, specifically, reducing the hydrogen procurement/supply cost to a level favorably comparable with that of existing energies while taking the calculated environmental value into account.