In August 2026, Chinese authorities granted approval to 5 regional hydrogen city clusters according to the nation’s four-year comprehensive hydrogen application pilot program. After the authorization, Impact Coatings is seeing higher orders along with customer projections for coatings of PEM fuel cell bipolar plates in China.
The Coating Service Center in Shanghai is back to full one-shift operation so as to meet the customer demand and will go to two-shift manufacturing toward the end of 2026.
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology – MIIT of China, Ministry of Finance – MOF, and National Development and Reform Commission – NDRC went on to announce the hydrogen pilot program in March 2026.
Interestingly, the program will go into execution in August 2026, with the approval of the five regional clusters.
It is well to be noted that five clusters have been approved, namely, Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the Greater Bay Area, Northeast China/Eastern Inner Mongolia-Yangtze River Delta, and Xinjiang-Chengdu-Chongqing, as well as the Yellow River/Central Plains region.
The clusters are located in various major industrial regions of China, with consequences that extend across the hydrogen industry supply chain, which includes component suppliers that constitute customers of Impact Coatings.
These 5 regional hydrogen city clusters will be qualified to receive a combined total of a maximum of RMB 8 billion, or $1.1 billion, in central government funding over a period of four years. The funding will be upfront, with the greatest amount of support in the initial year and then decreasing over time.
This is in line with the evaluation conducted by Impact Coatings in its Q2 2026 interim report, which was published on 21 August, that the expected rise in fuel cell market demand that followed the announcement of the pilot program in March 2026 had been deferred and not an alteration in underlying market conditions.
According to the CEO of Impact Coatings, Jonas Nilsson, “The approval of the five regional clusters provides the clarity the market has been waiting for. We are now seeing customers moving ahead with increased production, which is translating into increased orders for Impact Coatings. We believe customers are positioning themselves to secure market share, and we expect demand to grow as the program moves into implementation.”
The program encompasses the hydrogen value chain from production and storage to transportation and eventual use and seeks ways to scale up hydrogen applications across different industries and sectors. The four-year pilot program aligns with the renewed focus by China on hydrogen under the gamut of the 15th Five-Year Plan – 2026-2030.
The robust policy support for hydrogen from China signals the country’s aspiration to establish a world-leading hydrogen sector. In China Impact Coatings was established early mainly because of the size and the long-term prospects of the Chinese market. Since then the company has built up a dominant position in the Chinese market when it comes to the PVD coatings of fuel cell bipolar plates with its local operations as well as Coating Service Center in Shanghai.