BP and Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) have agreed to form a new joint venture that will include a retail service station network and aviation fuels business across India. Building on Reliance’s existing Indian fuel retailing network and an aviation fuel business, the partners expect the venture to expand rapidly to... Read more →

According to an independent study by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) and the Council on Energy, Environment, and Water (CEEW), more than 674 million Indian citizens are likely to breathe air with high concentrations of PM2.5 in 2030 even if India were to comply with its existing... Read more →

Toyota Motor Corporation and Suzuki Motor Corporation have agreed to begin considering concrete collaboration in new fields. Toyota and Suzuki have been considering the concrete details of such collaboration since having concluded a memorandum of understanding toward business partnership in February 2017. (Earlier post.) Toyota and Suzuki, in addition to... Read more →

Hyundai Motor Group and India-based Ola—one of the world’s largest ride-hailing platforms—announced a strategic partnership under which Hyundai Motor Company and Kia Motors Corporation will make their biggest combined investment to date, as part the Group’s continued efforts to become a Smart Mobility Solutions Provider. The agreement will see the... Read more →

Magnis Energy Technologies Limited announced that the Government of India, Ministry of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises advises that Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) and LIBCOIN (20% owned by Magnis) are in discussions to build India’s first Li-ion battery gigafactory. BHEL is India’s largest power generation equipment manufacturer; the government... Read more →

Hyundai Motor Company is partnering with -, India’s fastest growing self-drive car-sharing company, to develop an innovative car-sharing service and conduct creative marketing activities in India. The strategic partnership includes a Hyundai Motor investment in Revv. The strategic investment and partnership will enable both Hyundai Motor and Revv to build... Read more →

Exide Industries Ltd, India’s largest manufacturer of lead acid storage batteries and power storage solutions provider, and Switzerland-based Li-ion battery manufacturer Leclanché SA announced a joint venture to build lithium-ion batteries and provide energy storage systems for India’s electric vehicle market and grid-based applications. As part of the JV, Leclanché... Read more →

Toyota Motor Corporation and Suzuki Motor Corporation (Suzuki) agreed to start discussing new joint projects in the fields of technological development, vehicle production, and market development. After having concluded a memorandum of understanding toward business partnership on 6 February 2017 (earlier post), Toyota and Suzuki have been pursuing concrete forms... Read more →

India-based Ola, one of the world’s largest ride-hailing companies, launched “Mission: Electric”, with a commitment to place 10,000 E-rickshaws and Electric auto-rickshaws in its service in the next 12 months. The company will develop “Mission: Electric” as a platform to bring one million electric vehicles on the road by 2021.... Read more →

Mahindra Group and Ford Motor Company will jointly develop new SUVs, and a small electric vehicle as part of several initiatives announced between the two companies. The two companies signed five new memoranda of understanding (MoU) that further strengthen their strategic alliance and accelerate the development of key products for... Read more →

UQM Technologies, Inc. announced its first purchase order from Ashok Leyland, a major India commercial vehicle manufacturer. The purchase order is for 51 UQM PowerPhase eDT systems to be shipped during 2018 for a demonstration program for electric transit buses in India. The purchase order signifies the first step in... Read more →

Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd., a part of the US$19-billion Mahindra Group, and LG Chem, Korea’s leading manufacturer of advanced batteries, are collaborating in the field of advanced Li-ion battery technology. Under this collaboration, LG Chem will develop a unique cell exclusively for India application and will also supply Li-ion cells... Read more →

Westport Fuel Systems Inc. has entered into a development and supply agreement with Tata Motors Limited for their 4 cylinder and 6 cylinder natural gas spark-ignited commercial vehicle engine family to meet the Indian Government’s new Bharat Stage VI (BS-VI) emission standards, scheduled to take effect in April 2020. Westport... Read more →

India is the third-largest steel producer in the world after China and Japan, having surpassed other large steel-making countries such as the United States, Russia, and South Korea over the previous decade, according to the World Steel Association. In 2016, about 57% of India’s steel was produced using electric-based methods—the... Read more →

Although China and India remain the world’s largest consumers of coal, a new University of Maryland-led study found that China’s sulfur dioxide emissions fell by 75% since 2007, while India’s emissions increased by 50%. The results suggest that India is becoming, if it is not already, the world’s top sulfur... Read more →

Micro-organisms found in the wildfire-prone rainforests of India are an potential resources for biochemical production, as they are accustomed to the challenging conditions following a forest fire. The enzymes they produce are likely to also have a higher-than-normal resistance to the substances released from biomass in high-temperature industrial processes. An... Read more →

Mahindra Group and Ford Motor Company have agreed to explore a strategic alliance designed to leverage the benefits of Ford’s global reach and expertise and Mahindra’s scale in India and successful operating model. The agreement between the two companies will allow each to leverage their mutual strengths during a period... Read more →

The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) recently contracted with the International Centre for Automotive Technology (ICAT) of India to conduct laboratory and on-road testing of three in-use passenger vehicles—two diesel and one gasoline—to investigate the real world emission performance of passenger vehicles in Indian roads. The results highlight the... Read more →

Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IndianOil), India’s flagship national oil company and LanzaTech signed a Statement of Intent to construct the world’s first refinery offgas-to-bioethanol production facility in India. The basic engineering for the 40-million liter per year (10.6 million gallons US/year) demonstration facility will begin later this year for installation... Read more →

Greaves Cotton Limited, one of the leading engineering companies in India with core competencies in diesel and gasoline engines, farm equipment and gensets, and Pinnacle Engines, the developer of a high compression ratio, four-stroke, spark-ignited (SI), opposed-piston, sleeve-valve architecture engine (earlier post), announced a technology partnership for the launch of... Read more →

Suzuki Motor Corporation, Toshiba Corporation, and Denso Corporation have reached basic agreement on establishing a joint venture company for production of automotive lithium-ion battery packs in India, and signed the agreement. The initial capital expenditure will be ¥20 billion (US$184 million). The joint venture company will be capitalized at ¥2... Read more →

Researchers from the UK, Mexico and the US have found abundant magnetite nanoparticles in the brain tissue from 37 individuals aged three- to 92-years-old who lived in Mexico City and Manchester, UK. This strongly magnetic mineral has been implicated in the production of reactive oxygen species (free radicals) in the... Read more →

Chempolis Limited, a Finland-based biorefining technology corporation, has entered into partnership with India-based Avantha Group’s research wing—Avantha Centre for Industrial Research & Development (ACIRD)—on technology to produce ethanol from various agricultural residues for fuel blending. India’s agricultural sector produces large amounts of bagasse, cane trash, rice and wheat straw the... Read more →

UK-based fuel cell developer Intelligent Energy will purchase contracts from GTL Limited to supply energy-management services across more than 27,400 telecom towers in India—about 6.4% of the country’s total. Essential Energy, a subsidiary of Intelligent Energy in India, will assume the power management for the towers—a figure equivalent to 50%... Read more →

Suzuki Motor Corporation (SMC) will collaborate with the Malaysian national carmaker Proton Holdings Berhad. As the first step of the collaboration, SMC will supply KD (knocked down) components for a Suzuki model to Proton. Proton will manufacture the model at its own plant, and distribute and sell the model under... Read more →

Researchers from the CSIR-Indian Institute of Petroleum are proposing a biorefinery scheme using lignocellulosic biomass feedstock (sugarcane bagasse) for the production of fuel (ethanol), chemicals (furfural), and energy (electricity). The proposed scheme could be integrated with existing sugar or paper mills, where the availability of biomass feedstock is in abundance... Read more →

Algenol and Reliance Industries Ltd., have successfully deployed India’s first Algenol algae production platform. The demonstration module is located near the Reliance Jamnagar Refinery, the world’s largest. The demonstration has completed several production cycles of Algenol’s wildtype host algae, but ultimately could demonstrate the fuels production capabilities of Algenol’s advanced... Read more →

Despite safety concerns about equipment failure, a majority of drivers on three continents have high expectations for autonomous vehicles. Building on an earlier study on public opinion regarding self-driving vehicles in the US, Great Britain and Australia (earlier post), Brandon Schoettle and Michael Sivak of the University of Michigan Transportation... Read more →

Smog in India. Ozone, the main component of smog, is a plant-damaging pollutant formed by emissions from vehicles, cooking stoves and other sources. New research shows that ozone pollution damaged millions of tons of wheat, rice, soybean and cotton crops in India in 2005. Credit: Mark Danielson/Flickr Surface ozone pollution... Read more →

Improvement in fuel consumption in India of a hybrid vehicle over a conventional vehicle. Click to enlarge. In a pair of studies using real-world driving conditions, scientists at the US Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) found that hybrid cars are significantly more fuel-efficient in India and... Read more →

Tata 5L engine with GEMdi. Click to enlarge. Westport Innovations Inc. unveiled its newest proprietary dual-fuel technology: Westport gas enhanced methane diesel (Westport GEMDi), applied to Tata Motors’ new 5-liter dual-fuel methane-diesel engine. Westport GEMDi technology enables engine original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to offer a fully integrated, high performance engine... Read more →

Energy demand growth moves to Asia. Source: IEA. Click to enlarge. The newly released 2013 edition of the IEA World Energy Outlook (WEO) depicts a world in which some long-held tenets of the energy sector are being rewritten; importers are becoming exporters, while exporters are among the major sources of... Read more →

Australia’s CSIRO and its equivalent in India, the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), have launched a three-year, A$6-million (US$5.6-million) collaboration focused on improving processes involved in the production of dimethyl ether (DME), a clean-burning synthetic liquid fuel. DME is non-toxic and non-carcinogenic and can be produced from natural... Read more →

CO2 to acetic acid fermentation. Source: LanzaTech. Click to enlarge. LanzaTech, a producer of low-carbon fuels and chemicals from waste gases, has partnered with the Centre for Advanced Bio-Energy, a joint venture between Indian Oil Corporation, Ltd. (IOC) and the Indian government’s Department for Biotechnology (DBT), to create a novel... Read more →

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is providing $300 million towards a project that will replace 100,000 gasoline-burning tricycles in the Philippines with electric tricycles, or E-Trikes. About 3.5 million gas-fueled motorcycles and tricycles are currently operating in the Philippines, typically serving as short-distance taxis, with the average tricycle driver earning... Read more →

India’s National Council for Electric Mobility (NCEM) has adopted the National Electric Mobility Mission Plan 2020 (NEMMP 2020), which is the mission document for National Mission for Electric Mobility (NMEM). The NEMMP 2020 lays the vision, sets the targets and provides the roadmap for achieving significant penetration of electric vehicles... Read more →

The US Department of Energy announced the selections for three consortia that will make up the $125-million US-India Joint Clean Energy Research and Development Center (JCERDC). These consortia—led in theUS by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), the University of Florida, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL)—will bring together experts... Read more →

Indigo Manza Hybrid. Click to enlarge. Tata Motors showcased its alternate fuel technology capability at the New Delhi Auto Expo 2012 by displaying four concepts: the Tata Nano CNG; the Tata Indigo Manza diesel-electric hybrid; the Tata Starbus Fuel Cell (hydrogen); and the Tata Magic Iris CNG. The Tata Motors... Read more →

The new EcoSport. Click to enlarge. Ford is bringing its global EcoBoost powertrain technology to India for the first time with the debut of the 3-cylinder, 1.0L EcoBoost engine (earlier post) for the all-new Ford EcoSport, being previewed at Auto Expo 2012 in New Delhi. Despite its small capacity and... Read more →

Scientists are working to better understand atmospheric brown clouds and their effects. Credit: Nicolle Rager Fuller, National Science Foundation Click to enlarge. Pollution is making Arabian Sea cyclones more intense, according to a study in the journal Nature. Historically, prevailing wind shear patterns prohibit cyclones in the Arabian Sea from... Read more →

Light-duty vehicle sales, 2010 vs. 2020. Source: J.D. Power. Click to enlarge. India surpassed France, the United Kingdom and Italy to become the sixth-largest automotive market in the world in 2010, and it is expected to become one of the three largest automotive markets in the world by 2020, according... Read more →

Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) and Toyota Central R&D Labs., Inc., have developed a simulator able to predict tropospheric ozone concentrations across the whole of South and East Asia. The project was carried out in collaboration with Tsinghua University in China, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) in India, and the... Read more →

Map of deal interests. Click to enlarge. Reliance Industries Limited and BP have entered a strategic partnership across the full value chain in India. The partnership will see BP taking a 30% stake in 23 oil and gas production sharing contracts that Reliance operates in India, including the producing KG... Read more →

Fuel-based particulate matter emission factors (A: PM2.5 mass, B: organic carbon fraction (OC/PM), C: elemental carbon fraction (EC/PM)), global warming commitment (D: GWC-Kyoto, E: GWC-All), and F: fuel consumption. Credit: ACS, Reynolds et al. Click to enlarge. Chassis dynamometer emission testing conducted on 30 in-use Indian auto-rickshaws—two-stroke and four-stroke CNG-fueled... Read more →

Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and India’s Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) signed a three-year Strategic Alliance Agreement in Pune, India, to cooperate in the development of novel technologies in fuels research and engine development projects. The agreement between SwRI and CSIR, through its Indian Institute of Petroleum Laboratory... Read more →

India-based Praj Industries Limited and Qteros, Inc., the developer of a Consolidated Bioprocessing (CBP) platform for low-cost production of cellulosic ethanol using the Q-microbe (earlier post), have formed a strategic partnership to accelerate commercialization efforts for industrial-scale cellulosic ethanol production. Qteros also announced that it has closed the initial tranche... Read more →

Renewable energy targets and energy priority areas in the BRIMCS countries (not listed in order of importance or emphasis). Data: Kempener et al. Click to enlarge. A team of Harvard Kennedy School researchers has found that the governments of six key developing countries—Brazil, Russia, India, Mexico, China, and South Africa,... Read more →

Turnover of the US fleet under the three models of penetration. The circles represent the year in which new vehicle sales equal 100% alternative powertrains/fuel. Source: Belzowski and McManus. Click to enlarge. The US and China—as well as Western Europe, Japan and Brazil—could turnover more than 90% of their vehicle... Read more →

Maruti Suzuki, India’s car market leader, recently provided 10 SX4 Hybrid and 4 Eeco Charge EV concepts for the use at the Commonwealth Games, running in Delhi 3-14 October. Maruti Suzuki developed the SX4 Hybrid and Eeco Charge concepts as a part of the Government-initiated and SIAM (Society of Indian... Read more →

Maruti Suzuki, India’s largest car maker, unveiled its CNG engine technology, “intelligent-Gas Port Injection” (i-GPI) on five popular models: SX4, Eeco, WagonR, Estilo and Alto. The CNG models span entry level cars, compact cars, sedans and MPV segments and are being launched in Delhi NCR, Mumbai and Gujrat. The i-GPI... Read more →