Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) have created a new system—the least costly to date—that efficiently captures CO2 and converts it into methanol. The new PNNL carbon capture and conversion system brings the cost to capture CO2 down to about $39 per metric ton. The... Read more →

Chartwell Marine has won a £320k Innovate UK Smart Grant. The grant will enable Chartwell and consortium partners—Boat Electric & Electronics and Engineered Marine Systems—to develop and test the feasibility of a market-first methanol-fuelled vessel design, with applications in the offshore wind, commercial workboat and leisure sectors. Methanol fuel presents... Read more →

Advent Technologies Holdings will collaborate with Alfa Laval, a global provider of heat transfer, separation, and fluid handling products, on a project to explore applications of Advent’s methanol-powered high-temperature proton exchange membrane (HT-PEM) fuel cells in the marine industry. Funded by the Danish Energy Technology Development and Demonstration Program (EUDP),... Read more →

Tecnimont Private Limited, Indian subsidiary of Maire Tecnimont Group, has signed a non-binding Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with NTPC, India’s largest power generation company. The objective of the MOU is jointly to evaluate and explore the possibility to develop commercial-scale green methanol production facilities at NTPC projects in India. The... Read more →

The technology group Wärtsilä will supply its hybrid propulsion system for four new heavy lift vessels being built at the Wuhu Shipyard in China. The vessels have been contracted by SAL Heavy Lift GmbH, a German heavy lift and project cargo specialist and part of the Harren Group, in cooperation... Read more →

Iberdrola Australia and Australia-based hydrogen developer ABEL Energy will build a green hydrogen and green methanol production plant at Bell Bay in northern Tasmania (Australia). The project, called Bell Bay Powerfuels, is backed by the Australian government and will involve an investment of €1.1 billion. The Bell Bay Powerfuels Project... Read more →

Blue World Technologies has started the series production of its methanol fuel cells, marked with the official inauguration of the 8,500 m2 Blue Aalborg Factory. The fuel cell factory, which initially has an annual production capacity of 250,000 individual fuel cells, is located in an industrial area at the Port... Read more →

Ørsted’s Board of Directors has taken final investment decision (FID) on the 50,000 tonnes/year FlagshipONE e-methanol project. (Earlier post.) FlagshipONE will be Ørsted’s first commercial-scale Power-to-X facility and is an important step towards Ørsted’s ambition of taking a leading position in renewable hydrogen and green fuels. Reinforcing the commitment to... Read more →

The Danish fuel cell manufacturer Blue World Technologies is developing a methanol fuel cell-powered auxiliary power unit (APU) to replace conventional diesel generators for power supply on board ships. Blue World Technologies is a developer and manufacturer of high-temperature proton exchange membrane (HT PEM) fuel cells and will start series... Read more →

At its Dakar debut in January 2022, the Audi RS Q e-tron (earlier post) series hybrid set standards in efficiency and competitiveness of e-mobility in motorsport. In the next step, the three desert prototypes with electric drive and energy converter will run in the 2023 Dakar Rally with an innovative... Read more →

As part of the strategy to decarbonize its customers’ supply chains, A.P. Moller - Maersk (Maersk) has entered a green methanol partnership with US-based project developer Carbon Sink LLC. This is Maersk’s 8th such agreement in the efforts to accelerate global production of green methanol. The parties have signed a... Read more →

Hyundai’s shipbuilding division (HHI-SBD) has ordered 6 × MAN B&W G95ME-C10.5-LGIM dual-fuel main engines in connection with the construction of 6 × 17,000 teu container vessels for A.P. Moller – Maersk, the Danish integrated logistics company. Hyundai’s engine machinery division (HHI-EMD) will build the engines in Korea, which will be... Read more →

OWI Science for Fuels GmbH, TU Bergakademie Freiberg and RWTH Aachen University are investigating Methanol-to-gasoline (MtG) production for opportunities to optimize the process to produce ideal MtG fuels. MtG already meets the specifications of the EN 228 fuel standard for gasoline and is also expected to meet demanding future quality... Read more →

A.P. Moller - Maersk has ordered a further six large ocean-going vessels that can sail on green methanol. The six vessels will be built by Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) and have a nominal capacity of approx. 17,000 containers (Twenty Foot Equivalent - TEU). They will replace existing capacity in the... Read more →

Höegh Autoliners has joined the First Movers Coalition (FMC) to send a strong market demand signal for the emerging technologies essential for a net-zero transition. Höegh Autoliners has committed to running at least 5% of its deep-sea operations on either green ammonia or green methanol by 2030. Led by the... Read more →

Freudenberg has received Type Approval by the international classification society RINA for its methanol-powered fuel cell system for ocean-going shipping. Converting commercial ships on the high seas to CO2-neutral drive systems is a huge challenge. One important factor is the range requirement of the individual ship types. This must be... Read more →

Alfa Laval is the driving force in a marine fuel cell development project exploring the potential of high-temperature proton exchange membrane (HT-PEM) fuel cells using methanol as fuel as a source of marine auxiliary power. Funded by Danish EUDP (Energy Technology Development and Demonstration Program), the project is a joint... Read more →

Swiss marine power company WinGD and Korean engine builder HSD Engine have initiated a Joint Development Project (JDP) to advance the development of WinGD’s methanol-fueled big-bore engines. The aim is to deliver an engine capable of running on carbon-neutral green methanol by 2024, providing shipowners with a power solution enabling... Read more →

Blue World Technologies announced that the Bill Gates-founded Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV) entered as an investor in Blue World Technologies alongside Vaekstfonden (The Sovereign Investment Fund of Denmark), DEUTZ AG, and existing investors who invested back in December 2021 to complete the company’s €37-million series B round. In connection with... Read more →

Following the announcement of six strategic green methanol partnerships across the globe earlier this year, A.P. Moller - Maersk (Maersk) has added a seventh methanol partnership with Chinese bioenergy enterprise Debo on the quest to boost global production capacity. The parties have signed a Letter of Intent covering Debo’s plans... Read more →

Waste-to-biogas company Anaergia Inc. will supply European Energy A/S with up to 60,000 tonnes per year of liquefied biogenic CO2 for a period of 10 years. Biogenic carbon dioxide is carbon dioxide that is released during the decomposition of organic matter such as food waste. All Anaergia plants use organic... Read more →

In this year’s largest methanol order to date, the Alfa Laval FCM (Fuel Conditioning Module) Methanol will be the low-flashpoint fuel supply system (LFSS) on six dual-fuel container vessels. The system was chosen for both its real-life performance and its high design flexibility. Alfa Laval will provide the methanol LFSS... Read more →

UK-based Expleo, a global engineering, technology and consultancy service provider, has developed a closed-loop fuel solution for global shipping that delivers a 92% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions (GHGe) in the model vessel. Expleo modeled its system-of-systems solution on the multi-tasking Bibby Wavemaster 1, a vessel used to service offshore... Read more →

MAN Energy Solutions has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Stena Teknik—Stena’s inhouse R&D division—and Proman—the world’s second largest methanol producer—regarding cooperation on a project to retrofit MAN 48/60 engines to make them capable of dual-fuel diesel and methanol operation. The MAN 48/60 (Bore: 480 mm – Stroke: 600... Read more →

The EU is investing more than €1.8 billion in 17 large-scale innovative clean-tech projects with a third round of awards under the Innovation Fund. Grants will be disbursed from the Innovation Fund to help bring technologies to the market in energy-intensive industries, hydrogen, renewable energy, carbon capture and storage infrastructure,... Read more →

The EU-funded HyMethShip project developed a system that innovatively combined a membrane reactor, a CO2 capture system, a storage system for CO2 and methanol as well as a hydrogen-fueled combustion engine to power ships. The top part of the graphic shows onshore methanol production. The bottom part shows how hydrogen... Read more →

Sundsvall Energi will partner with Liquid Wind to be the host and provide carbon dioxide for the second commercial-scale—100,000 t—electrofuel facility in Sweden. Biogenic carbon dioxide from the Sundsvall energy facility will be captured and combined with renewable hydrogen to generate green electrofuel, eMethanol. The fuel is intended for the... Read more →

ExxonMobil has developed a unique process technology to enable the manufacture of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) from renewable methanol. This expands upon ExxonMobil’s suite of technology solutions that are engineered to manufacture SAF from other biofeeds. SAF produced from renewable methanol can play an important role in helping the aviation... Read more →

Advent Technologies signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Laskaridis Shipping Company Ltd., a ship management company based in Athens, Greece, with a fleet of 90 vessels, which includes 55 midsized or large dry bulk vessels. Under the terms of the MoU, Laskaridis and Advent will jointly conduct a pilot... Read more →

Element 1 Corporation (e1NA), Zhejiang Methanol Hydrogen Technology (ZMHT) and Zhejiang Element 1 (e1China) have formed a joint venture company—Zhejiang Hydrogen One Energy Technology Co., Ltd.— to drive methanol-based hydrogen generation technology and commercialize e1NA’s technology throughout Greater China. The new JV will have rights to sell e1NA’s S-Series product... Read more →

Geely recently launched its Methanol Hybrid Emgrand (earlier post) in the Chinese market. The methanol hybrid is based on Geely’s fourth-generation B-segment Modular Architecture (BMA) Emgrand sedan. Geely also offers a non-hybrid methanol-fueled version of the Emgrand. Previous generation methanol vehicles faced difficulties with cold starts but with Geely Auto’s... Read more →

Researchers at the Clemson Nanomaterials Institute (CNI) and their collaborators from the Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning (SSSIHL) in India discovered a novel way to combine curcumin—the substance in turmeric—and gold nanoparticles to create an electrode that requires 100 times less energy to convert ethanol or methanol into... Read more →

Methanol—a bio-based platform molecule that can be used directly as a fuel or fuel additive, and can also be used to produce bulk chemicals and drop-in fuels—is currently mainly produced from methane and coal via an indirect syngas route. Now, a team of researchers in China reports a novel approach... Read more →

Landsvirkjun, The National Power Company of Iceland, and German investment company PCC SE have agreed to explore the possibility of capturing and utilizing carbon emissions from PCC’s silicon metal plant in northeast Iceland. Carbon emissions will be utilized to produce green methanol that can, for example, replace fossil fuel in... Read more →

Metsä Fibre, part of Metsä Group, and Veolia recently signed a long-term partnership agreement on the refining of crude methanol generated in pulp production at the Äänekoski bioproduct mill into commercial biomethanol. As part of this cooperation, Veolia will build a crude methanol refinery in connection with Metsä Fibre’s Äänekoski... Read more →

Researchers at the University of Surrey (UK) are developing a process to capture carbon dioxide directly from the air and then use dynamic catalysis to create methanol—a valuable chemical that, made this way, could be carbon-negative. Its value could offset the cost of direct air capture. The carbon negative chemicals... Read more →

In support of the Danish initiative to promote the production and development of green e-methanol (earlier post), Zhejiang Geely Holding Group (Geely Holding) is partnering with Circle K Denmark, Aalborg University, and Fonden Green Hub Denmark to collaborate on a 15-month test and demonstration trial for green e-methanol fuel and... Read more →

The Danish developer of renewable energy European Energy and Denmark’s largest inland port, Port of Aalborg, signed a letter of intent that secures European Energy an option for a 25-hectare area at the Eastern Port in Aalborg, which is planned to be the location for a new electrolysis plant with... Read more →

Geely is testing the world’s first methanol hybrid sedan in sub -40 °C (-40 ˚F) Arctic conditions in the frigid northern Chinese province of Heilongjiang. Geely’s latest Methanol Hybrid Emgrand is based on Geely Auto’s fourth-generation B-Segment Modular Architecture (BMA) Emgrand sedan. The new Emgrand runs on 100% clean methanol... Read more →

Wärtsilä has developed a dedicated fuel supply system for methanol—MethanolPac—as interest grows in the methanol pathway to decarbonize shpping. Combined with the recently introduced Wärtsilä 32 Methanol engine and the company’s well-proven retrofit and system integration capabilities, MethanolPac enables Wärtsilä to deliver methanol-capable fuel and power systems across a wide... Read more →

Methanol reformers convert easy-to-transport methanol into hydrogen. However, conventional reformers have a number of drawbacks such as catalyst attrition. Researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute for Microengineering and Microsystems IMM are working on an innovative methanol reformer for mobile applications to overcome these challenges. Transporting hydrogen can be a complex process.... Read more →

To boost the global production capacity of green methanol, A.P. Moller - Maersk (Maersk) is entering strategic partnerships with six leading companies with the intent of sourcing at least 730,000 tonnes/year by end of 2025. The six companies are CIMC ENRIC, European Energy, Green Technology Bank, Orsted, Proman, and WasteFuel.... Read more →

European Energy, a Danish developer and operator of green energy projects, has ordered a 50 MW electrolyzer from Siemens Energy for use in developing the first large-scale commercial e-Methanol production facility. The plan is that the plant will be built in Kassø, located west of Aabenraa in the South of... Read more →

Researchers from Lehigh University, in collaboration with colleagues from the East China University of Science and Technology (ECUST), have developed an induced activation strategy to enhance the performance of the ternary Cu/Zu/AL2O3 catalyst towards the methanol steam reforming (MSR) reaction (used as a model reaction). Cu/Zu/AL2O3 is an important industrial... Read more →

Ørsted and Liquid Wind AB have reached an agreement under which Ørsted will acquire a 45% ownership share of Liquid Wind AB’s FlagshipONE e-methanol project. (Earlier post.) FlagshipONE is a late-stage development project and could become the world’s first large-scale sustainable e-methanol project. Liquid Wind AB plans to establish a... Read more →

25 The technology group Wärtsilä has received its first order for newbuild methanol-fueled engines. A new Offshore Wind Installation Vessel (WIV) being built for Dutch contracting company Van Oord at Yantai CIMC Raffles shipyard in China will be powered by five Wärtsilä 32 engines capable of operating with methanol. A... Read more →

Vertimass and European Energy have completed a Letter of Intent (LOI) to integrate technologies for capturing carbon dioxide and converting it into hydrocarbon products around the world. This combination takes advantage of European Energy’s expertise in capturing carbon dioxide from waste sources (carbon dioxide produced from anaerobic digestion, power production,... Read more →

Vaekstfonden, the Danish Growth Fund, and the German engine manufacturer DEUTZ AG, are investing €15 million in methanol fuel cell company Blue World Technologies. The aim is to bring the company’s green fuel cell products and solutions to the global market. The Blue World Technologies fuel cells are based on... Read more →

Rolls-Royce is focusing on methanol as a fuel for climate-friendly shipping; Rolls-Royce business unit Power Systems is currently developing mtu engines for use with methanol. The new high-speed four-stroke engines, which are based on proven mtu technologies, are planned to be available to customers as soon as possible for use... Read more →

Maritime classification society the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) has granted Alfa Laval the first marine approval for operating boilers on methanol. Alfa Laval received an approval in principle (AIP) on 4 November 2021, based on extensive solution testing at the Alfa Laval Test & Training Center. Marine boilers generate... Read more →