Option for producing ‘hydrogen electricity’ is being examined: PM

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Wednesday said discussions are on to produce hydrogen electricity from sea water.

Referring to the new concept of hydrogen power generation from sea water, she said discussions are underway with all the companies that gave proposals in this regard.

"If possible, feasibility study of hydrogen power generation at Matarbari, Maheshkhali or Banshkhali will be done," she said while responding to a tabled question from ruling party member Anwar Hossain Khan.

The prime minister said in some countries of the world, electricity is generated by using the tides of the sea, which is costly and has not been commercially successful.

"There are currently no plans to set up such a power plant as it is costly," she said.

She informed parliament about the idea of producing hydrogen electricity from sea water.

Mentioning that it is very costly, she said that in the future, if the cost of constructing such power plants comes down, the plan to use the tides of the Bay of Bengal for electricity production can be adopted to build a power plant.

In response to ruling party MP Kazim Uddin Ahmed's question, the prime minister said as a result of the government's action, a record number of 11,13,374 workers have been employed abroad in 2022.

"Among them, the number of women workers is 1,05,466," she added.

She said Bangladesh currently exports manpower to 168 countries and the government wanted to reduce manpower export dependency in the Middle Eastern countries.

"For that purpose, a move is on to export manpower in Eastern Europe and Eastern Asian countries," she said.

While responding to ruling party MP Mahfuzur Rahman, Sheikh Hasina said 1,558 bridges and 7,498 culverts have been constructed or reconstructed during the tenure of the current government.

"Improvement of 908.49 kilometres of road to four lanes or more is in progress. Out of this, 235.03 kilometres of road have already been made into four lanes or more," she said.