The great hydrogen gamble: hot air or net zero’s holy grail?
theguardian.comStanding in front of a lime green doubledecker hydrogen bus, Jo Bamford posed for a photo alongside transport secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan at the Conservative party conference’s “hydrogen zone” in Birmingham.
A week earlier the JCB heir’s team was busy with photocalls featuring Labour heavyweights Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves and Ed Miliband at the Labour conference in Liverpool.
The political offensive was emblematic of the Bamford dynasty’s close political ties and the hydrogen industry’s eagerness to foster goodwill in Westminster. Companies including Cadent, National Grid, Centrica and boiler maker Worcester Bosch joined Bamford’s companies Ryze Hydrogen and Wrightbus in trying to convince Labour and Conservative MPs that hydrogen, the emissionless, highly combustible gas, can be a valuable weapon in the fight against the climate crisis.
Bamford’s political connections are well-known: his billionaire father Anthony is a big Tory party donor, mainly via JCB. The peer helped to pay for Boris Johnson’s wedding celebrations and the former prime minister even accepted free accommodation for his family from Lord Bamford’s wife, Carole, last month.
Johnson smashed a polystyrene wall in a JCB digger bearing the slogan “Get Brexit done” in 2019 and earlier this year visited its production facility in India.
Since Jo Bamford bought bankrupt London bus maker Wrightbus in 2019, the grandson of JCB founder Joseph Cyril Bamford has bet big on hydrogen. It has won several taxpayer-funded contracts for green transport, including an £11.2m deal to develop hydrogen fuel cell technology in Northern Ireland. Last year, he launched HyCap, a £1bn investment fund designed to back hydrogen specialists from producers to fuelling stations and
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