Energy Security and the Hydrogen Outlook
- Geopolitical disruptions, particularly in the Middle East, have highlighted energy security risks beyond oil and gas, impacting industrial supply chains like ammonia, urea, and methanol (p. 1).
  - The Middle East accounts for about one-sixth of global hydrogen production, over 25% of global ammonia trade, nearly 40% of urea trade, and around 45% of methanol trade (p. 1).
  - Disruptions in 2026 caused significant volatility, including an 80% spike in urea prices compared to pre-conflict levels (p. 1).
- Low-emissions hydrogen offers domestic production opportunities for countries with renewable resources, especially for existing applications like refining, ammonia, and methanol (pp. 1, 3).
- The low-emissions hydrogen industry remains small, expected to account for just over 1% of the projected 100Mt+ global hydrogen production in 2026 (p. 3).
Commercial Obstacles and Policy Shifts
- Hydrogen development continues to face high production costs, infrastructure constraints, uncertain offtake, and investment challenges (p. 3).
- Metals Focus forecasts 7.2GW of global electrolyser installations in 2026, compared to an originally planned pipeline of 20.8GW (p. 3).
- Governments are shifting from ambitious targets to selective support for projects with credible demand, financing, and commercial viability (p. 3).
Fuel-Cell Deployment and PGM Demand
- Energy resilience is driving fuel-cell deployment in critical facilities like data centres (p. 5).
- Metals Focus forecasts ~1GW of stationary and portable fuel-cell installations globally in 2026, with ~38% of stationary systems expected to use PGM-based technologies (p. 5).
- PGM demand from the hydrogen economy is projected to reach 154koz in 2026, representing an 18% year-over-year increase and a sevenfold increase from a decade ago (p. 5).
Precious Metals Market Briefs (August 2026)
- Gold prices rose above $4,450/oz following US Treasury plans to increase buybacks of longer-dated bonds (p. 1).
- India added a record 27GW of solar capacity in H1 2026, bringing its total installed PV capacity to 165GW by the end of June (p. 1).
- Global platinum ETP holdings reached a two-month high of 3,006koz (p. 1).
- Southern Palladium was granted a 30-year mining right for the Bengwenyama PGM and chrome project (p. 1).

Could energy security strengthen hydrogen’s PGM demand outlook?

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