Seizing the green hydrogen opportunity? Comparing strategies for industrial transformation in latecomer countries

Green hydrogen is often promoted as a pathway to reconcile economic growth with environmental sustainability, yet its implications for industrial development in the Global South remain contested. While it offers potential to decarbonise hard-to-abate sectors and foster industrial upgrading, systematic comparative analyses of how emerging economies pursue these opportunities are limited. This paper examines how Brazil, Chile, China, and South Africa approach the emerging green hydrogen window of opportunity to advance industrial transformation. The study combines content analysis of national strategies with contextual data on structural preconditions and policy responses. The analysis reveals divergent strategic orientations, ranging from state-led coordination to market facilitation and export-driven pragmatism, reflecting contrasting institutional capacities, industrial structures, and development priorities. These differences shape the depth and direction of learning and localisation processes. The findings suggest that green hydrogen's transformative potential depends less on the technological promise than on the state's ability to embed it within coherent industrial policy systems, underscoring the need for context-sensitive and adaptive policy designs rather than universal blueprints for green industrialisation.