Fishermen in Kakinada fear AM Green’s proposed green hydrogen and green ammonia plant could worsen coastal pollution and further reduce fish catch.
The project is part of India’s push to produce green hydrogen and ammonia for export to European countries, including Germany.
Local fishing communities say existing industries have already pushed fish stocks farther offshore, increasing fuel costs and reducing earnings.
Activists and scientists have called for public consultation and stronger environmental scrutiny, warning of risks to marine ecology, farmland, livelihoods and the nearby Coringa Wildlife Sanctuary.
On an open floor of a government building near the lighthouse in Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh, M Raju sits repairing fishing nets with other fishermen from Suryapet. The 47-year-old says fishing in the Bay of Bengal off Kakinada has become harder over the past 15 years.
“Earlier, we did not have to go very far. Now we have to sail 50 kilometres (km) to 60 km into the sea to catch fish,” he said. He blames the decline on industrial activity along the coast. Raju fears that a new green ammonia and green hydrogen plant, about 3 km away, could worsen the situation.
“If there is more pollution, fishing will go down further. Earlier, one boat with 15 to 20 people could catch fish worth Rs 15,000 to Rs 20,000 in a two- or three-day trip. Now we hardly earn Rs 400 to Rs 500 per person,” he said. “Our livelihood is at stake.”
The plant, developed by AM Green Ammonia (India) Pvt Ltd at Kakinada, is being planned as a large-scale green hydrogen and green ammonia production and export hub. It has a proposed green hydrogen capacity of 128,000 Normal Cubic Meter per hour (Nm³ per hour) and green ammonia capacity of 1,500 tonnes per day.
A large signboard marks the company’s site. An electronic display showing pollution levels of various pollutants, mandated under environmental rules, is installed above the security cabin. Security guards said no one was allowed inside the plant without prior appointment, following instructions from the site manager.
AM Green did not respond to emailed questions seeking details about job creation, production processes and environmental safeguards.
India launched its National Green Hydrogen Mission in 2023, aiming to position the country as a global hub for production, use and export of green hydrogen and its derivatives.
Germany adopted its National Hydrogen strategy in 2020. In October 2024, India and Germany signed an Indo-German Green Hydrogen Roadmap under the Indo-German Energy Forum to deepen technological, commercial and regulatory collaboration.
India has set a target of reaching net-zero emissions by 2070, while Germany aims to do so by 2045.
During German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s visit to India in January, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Merz welcomed an agreement between AM Green and Uniper. AM Green has also signed an agreement with Belgium’s John Cockerill to buy 1.3 gigawatts of electrolysers to produce its first one million tonnes of green ammonia.
The company has received Renewable Fuel of Non-Biological Origin certification, which is required to export green fuels to European countries. Such fuels are produced from renewable electricity rather than biomass and are designed to meet European Union sustainability and decarbonisation standards.
India’s Green Hydrogen Mission says the sector could create 600,000 jobs a year. AM Green is expected to generate 8,000 jobs during construction and “substantial” high-skill employment during operations.
But local fishermen, farmers and activists say the Kakinada project could damage existing livelihoods in fishing and agriculture.At Uppada fishing harbour, about 10 km from Kakinada, trucks are loaded with containers of fish as fishermen and women sit along the road selling their catch.
Raju Surada, a local fishermen’s union leader, said fishing families were worried about the green ammonia plant and other chemical industries along the Andhra Pradesh coast.
“We have heard this green ammonia factory will discharge polluted water and hazardous material in the surrounding area, including the sea, as the factory is within 3 km of the Kakinada coast,” he said. “This will further reduce fish populations.”
Surada said pollution, including oil discharge from factories along the coast, had already affected fish availability.
“Earlier, fish were available closer to the shore. Now we have to go 80 km to 100 km into the sea. That means more diesel, more time and more investment, while income remains the same,” he said.
He said that in the past, about 100 containers or trucks, each carrying 300 boxes of fish weighing 25 kilogrammes each, would be sent every day to markets in Goa, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and other states. Now, he claimed, only about 20 containers are sent each day during the fishing season.
Most people in Uppada and nearby villages depend on fishing, Surada said. He added that 30 per cent to 40 per cent of local youth migrate seasonally to other parts of Andhra Pradesh or to other states for fishing, construction and other work.
Asked whether the new plant could create jobs for local youth, fishermen said factories rarely hired local workers.
“They bring migrant workers from West Bengal, Odisha, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh because they do not raise their voices against exploitative conditions,” one fisherman said. “Hardly any local fishermen or farmers work in these factories. We also do not prefer to work there because of the continuous chemical smell that affects our health.”
Environmental advocates say India’s green hydrogen projects require closer scrutiny, particularly when located near sensitive coastal ecosystems and dense settlements.
In India, green hydrogen plants are exempt from obtaining mandatory environmental clearance, according to current rules. AM Green has also sought a waiver from public consultation, a process under the Environmental Impact Assessment framework meant to assess, predict and mitigate the environmental and social impacts of a proposed project.
AM Green has sought a waiver from public consultation, a process under the Environmental Impact Assessment framework meant to assess, predict and mitigate the environmental and social impacts of a proposed project.
The Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change is considering the project.
Scientists for People, a collective of technical analysts and environmental advocates, has asked the ministry to defer appraisal of the project. It says the plant poses risks to the surrounding ecosystem and to Kakinada’s roughly 400,000 residents.
K Babu Rao, chief of the collective, said the project was being developed at the site of a now-defunct fertiliser plant that produced ammonia and urea. He said the earlier environmental clearance, granted about 30 years ago, was for a different industrial activity that never commenced.
“The current plant is a large-scale green hydrogen, green ammonia production and export hub, involving massive new infrastructure — alkaline electrolysers, cryogenic air separation units, large-bore hydrogen pipelines and a new 20-inch cross-country liquid ammonia pipeline to the port,” he said. “This is not an incremental amendment; it is a qualitatively different industrial enterprise.”
The collective has called for a public consultation, a quantitative risk assessment, an off-site emergency plan and clearance from the National Board for Wildlife because of the nearby Coringa Wildlife Sanctuary.
Rao also alleged that the project was not fully green because grey hydrogen production was also planned. He said the project could pollute nearby ecosystems, including marine ecology, and affect fishing and farming livelihoods.
Water use is another concern for local communities and environmental experts. AM Green’s desalination unit is expected to meet 50 per cent of the plant’s raw water requirement, estimated at 1,042 cubic metres per hour.
Desalination plants produce brine, a highly saline waste stream that may also contain chemicals and be warmer than surrounding seawater. Environmental experts say brine discharge can reduce oxygen levels in water and affect marine organisms, with possible impacts across the food chain.
The United Nations Environment Programme has warned that brine discharge from desalination can contribute to hypoxia, or low oxygen conditions, harming organisms living at the bottom of water bodies.
Fishermen fear such impacts could further reduce fish populations and affect their livelihoods. AM Green did not respond to emailed questions about the proposed desalination unit or concerns raised by scientists, fishermen and activists.
The Andhra Pradesh government, which oversees the project, also did not respond to emailed questions. (LINK WAS INVALID)
Experts say similar concerns may emerge around other green hydrogen plants proposed near ports, including in Mundra and Kandla in Gujarat, as India expands its green fuel export ambitions under international collaborations.
For fisherwomen such as Saroda Nagamani, 50, the concern is immediate.
She cleans and dries fish brought in by her husband and two sons, before selling them in the market. Nagamani said her income has fallen to about a fourth of what it was 25 years ago because of pollution and climate change. She now depends on whatever catch her husband and sons are able to bring back each day.
For fishing communities along the Kakinada coast, the promise of green hydrogen is being measured against an older question: whether new clean-energy industries can be built without weakening the livelihoods that already exist around them.
This article has been prepared as part of the India-Germany Climate and Energy Journalism Programme, organised by Clean Energy Wire with support from the Heinrich Böll Foundation.