The US Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy (FE) plans to make $160 million in federal funding (DE-FOA-0002400) available to help recalibrate the US’ vast fossil-fuel and power infrastructure for decarbonized energy and commodity production. The funding, for cost-shared cooperative agreements, is aimed to develop technologies for the... Read more →

Norway-based energy company Equinor Energy and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for a low-carbon technology collaboration. The non-exclusive cooperation agreement will see both companies develop and use technology to reduce the carbon footprint of oil & gas operations. In particular, the companies will look at... Read more →

Noble Gas Systems, a startup founded to create safe, conformable, lightweight compressed gas storage and delivery systems, has demonstrated its latest generation of conformable gas tanks, which can be configured into existing vehicle architectures. The new tanks, with working pressures of 350 bar (5,000 psi), are lightweight and less than... Read more →

Monolith Materials, Inc. has received an investment from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America, Inc. to support its commercial-scale, emissions-free hydrogen manufacturing technology. The announcement is the latest in a series of recent strategic investments made by MHI in support of achieving a decarbonized world. Monolith Materials is the first US manufacturer... Read more →

Landi Renzo, the American subsidiary of Landi Renzo Group, the global leader in eco-fuel advanced systems for the automotive industry, received California Air Resources Board (CARB) Certification for the Heavy Duty Ford CNG/RNG 7.3L engine, which covers Class 4-7 vehicles. Supported vehicles include the F-450/550, F-650/750, F-53/59 and E-450. The... Read more →

A new hydrocarbon study led by researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory contradicts conventional wisdom about how methane is trapped in rock, revealing a new strategy to access the valuable energy resource more easily. Their open-access study is published in Nature’s new Communications Earth & Environment journal. Partners include the... Read more →

Yet-to-find (YTF) resources will contribute to around 30% of the total production of natural gas worldwide by 2050, according to Yury Sentyurin, the Secretary General of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF). According to Sentyurin, around 80% of the natural gas production by mid-century will stem from new projects, highlighting... Read more →

The new VW Golf is now also available in certain markets with natural gas drive: the Golf TGI is equipped with a 1.5-liter four-cylinder engine with 96 kW / 130 PS and three natural gas fuel tanks. The tanks are integrated into the underbody and permit a range of around... Read more →

Transform Materials has developed a novel and sustainable microwave plasma reactor process to convert natural gas into high-value hydrogen and acetylene, thereby opening up a new pathway for green chemical manufacturing. Transform Materials offers compact, modular and multiplexed plasma reactors producing high-purity hydrogen and acetylene that customers can integrate into... Read more →

The US Department of Energy (DOE) announced $24 million in funding for 2 projects as part of the first stage of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy’s (ARPA-E) Seeding Critical Advances for Leading Energy technologies with Untapped Potential (SCALEUP) program. These SCALEUP “Fast-Track” teams, Natron Energy and Bridger Photonics, will receive... Read more →

Audi is adding a new member to its A3 family: the A3 Sportback 30 g-tron natural gas vehicle. Operation with natural gas or biomethane makes the compact model economical and more climate-friendly with low emissions. Sales in Germany and other European countries begin in fall 2020 at a base price... Read more →

Verkehr und Wasser GmbH (VWG) in Oldenburg, Germany has acquired 15 new MAN Lion’s City 12 G EfficientHybrid natural gas buses. The new buses have a crankshaft starter generator on board that converts braking recuperation energy into electrical energy. When the new MAN buses brake, then that is a real... Read more →

Fortistar and Paloma Dairy have begun construction on a dairy digester renewable natural gas (RNG) facility, the Sunoma Renewable Biofuel Project. The new facility will produce 1.6 million gasoline gallon equivalents (GGE) of vehicle fuel annually for the Class 8 trucking sector—enough fuel to move 10 million miles of freight.... Read more →

Diakont is part of a team that was awarded $5 million in funding from the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA-E) Rapid Encapsulation of Pipelines Avoiding Intensive Replacement (REPAIR) program (earlier post) to develop new technologies for rehabilitating legacy cast iron and bare steel natural gas distribution... Read more →

Anheuser-Busch is transitioning more than 180 trucks—representing approximately 30% of its dedicated fleet—to Renewable Natural Gas (RNG). In 2014 and 2015, Anheuser-Busch converted 160 diesel-fueled trucks in Houston and St. Louis to fleets powered by Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) engines. As the next step to achieve its 2025 sustainability goal... Read more →

The US Department of Energy announced $33 million in funding for 10 projects as part of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy’s (ARPA-E) Rapid Encapsulation of Pipelines Avoiding Intensive Replacement (REPAIR) program. REPAIR teams will develop natural gas transmission pipeline retrofitting technology to rehabilitate existing cast iron and bare steel pipes... Read more →

After growing by more than 2% in 2019, global gas use is set to fall by around 4% in 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic reduces energy consumption across the global economies. However, the resulting low gas prices, as well as clean air and climate policies, will promote further switching to... Read more →

Agility Fuel Solution, a leading global provider of clean fuel solutions for medium- and heavy-duty commercial vehicles, introduced its new third-generation roof-mount compressed natural gas (CNG) fuel system for Automated Side Loader, Rear End Loader and Front End Loader refuse collection vehicles. Agility introduced its roof-mount CNG fuel systems for... Read more →

The representatives of the management board of public transport operator Miejskie Zakłady Autobusowe (MZA) in Warsaw and Solaris signed a contract for the delivery of 70 low-floor city buses. The vehicles will run on CNG. The total value of the contract is more than PLN 116 million (US$31 million). MZA... Read more →

Researchers from the GEOMAR Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research Kiel have found that considerable quantities of the greenhouse gas methane escape uncontrolled into the water from abandoned oil and gas wells in the North Sea. The work, published in the International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control, confirms earlier studies based... Read more →

The Institute for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI) will receive $2.7 million from the US Department of Energy (DOE) to develop and validate technology that will reduce the cost of manufacturing high-performance carbon fiber by 25% to make composite natural gas or hydrogen fuel tanks to power cars and trucks.... Read more →

OptiFuel Systems, a system integrator of Cummins and BAE Systems hybrid power products for decarbonizing the rail, marine, and microgrid power market, is in the process of finalizing a $2.6 million US Department of Energy (DOE) grant to demonstrate a pre-production Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) hybrid 4,300 hp line-haul locomotive.... Read more →

Baker Hughes and Snam have successfully completed testing of the world’s first “hybrid” hydrogen turbine designed for a gas network. The test paves the way to implement adoption of hydrogen blended with natural gas in Snam’s current transmission network infrastructure. The test took place at Baker Hughes’ facility in Florence,... Read more →

Chevron is partnering with California natural gas retailer Clean Energy Fuels Corp. on Adopt-a-Port, an initiative that provides truck operators serving the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach with cleaner, carbon-negative renewable natural gas (RNG) to reduce emissions. For its part, Chevron will provide funding for Adopt-a-Port and supply... Read more →

Dominion Energy and Duke Energy announced the cancelation of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) due to ongoing delays and increasing cost uncertainty which threaten the economic viability of the project. The Atlantic Coast Pipeline as planned was a 600-mile underground natural gas transmission line meant to deliver new, lower-cost supplies... Read more →

NREL has issued a request for proposals for qualified partners to participate in cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA) projects with the US Department of Energy's (DOE's) national laboratories in support of DOE’s H2@Scale initiative. Through this CRADA call, DOE's Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies Office (HFTO) seeks to accelerate... Read more →

Hyliion Inc., a developer of electrified powertrain solutions for Class 8 commercial vehicles, launched its Hypertruck Electric Range Extender (ERX), a long-haul, natural-gas series-hybrid electric powertrain. The launch of the Hypertruck ERX is anchored by Agility, one of the world’s leading logistics companies with $5.2 billion in revenue and offices... Read more →

Agility Fuel Solutions (Agility), a leading global provider of clean fuel solutions for medium- and heavy-duty commercial vehicles, introduced the new fifth-generation ProRail CNG fuel system. ProRail systems are installed on one or both sides of the vehicle’s frame rail. Gen5 ProRail installed on a Peterbilt 567. Since the ProRail... Read more →

Ingevity and Ozinga Energy are partnering to begin a field demonstration of adsorbed natural gas (ANG) bi-fuel pickup trucks. Developed by Adsorbed Natural Gas Products, Inc. (ANGP) and Ingevity, the ANG system is made possible by the performance of Ingevity’s Nuchar activated carbon that significantly lowers the natural gas storage... Read more →

Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment (CLEE) released a new report “Legal Grounds: Law and Policy Options to Facilitate a Phase-Out of Fossil Fuel Production in California.” The report analyzes steps California leaders could pursue on state- and privately-owned lands to achieve this reduction. California is the... Read more →

A comprehensive three-year scientific study into the air, water and soil impacts of hydraulic fracturing (HF) in coal seam gas (CSG) in Queensland, Australia has found little to no impacts on air quality, soils, groundwater and waterways. The study also found current water treatment technology used for treating water produced... Read more →

A research team led by Northwestern University has designed and synthesized new metal-organic framework (MOF) materials with ultrahigh porosity and surface area for the storage of hydrogen and methane for fuel cell-powered vehicles. The designer materials can store significantly more hydrogen and methane than conventional adsorbent materials at much safer... Read more →

The trajectory of North American gas supply is set to change radically as a result of the fall in oil prices that has occurred due to COVID-19 and the breakdown in production cooperation between OPEC and Russia, according to IHS Markit. Prior to the global pandemic, languishing North America gas... Read more →

The all-new SEAT Leon offers five different powertrain technologies: gasoline (TSI); diesel (TDI); mild-hybrid (eTSI); plug-in hybrid (eHybrid); and compressed natural gas (TGI). SEAT is a member of the Volkswagen Group. In total, there are eleven different mechanical variants, with power outputs ranging from 90 PS with the 1.0 TSI... Read more →

The Intermountain Power Agency (IPA) has awarded Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems (MHPS) a contract for two M501JAC power trains for the Intermountain Power Plant (IPP) in Delta, Utah. (Earlier post.) This award marks the first Advanced Class Gas Turbines in the industry specifically designed and purchased as part of a... Read more →

The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, and Masten Space Systems Inc. successfully tested a liquid methane rocket engine, the first of its kind tested at AFRL. The Masten 25k lbf thrust Broadsword rocket engine. (Masten Space Systems photo/Matthew Kuhns) The M10A Broadsword is a LOX/LCH4... Read more →

An international collaboration led by Cranfield University will examine the potential for the low-carbon production of hydrogen from natural gas. The HyPER project (Bulk Hydrogen Production by Sorbent Enhanced Steam Reforming) will construct a 1.5 MWth pilot plant at Cranfield University to test the innovative hydrogen production technology that substantially... Read more →

California’s South Coast Air Quality Management District’s (South Coast AQMD) Clean Fuel Funds and Southern California Gas Company (SoCalGas) have awarded a combined $600,000 ($300,000 each) to Landi Renzo USA for Landi Renzo’s 7.3L Near-Zero natural gas engine development program, which covers Class 4-7 vehicles. Landi Renzo USA is the... Read more →

UPS has entered into multi-year renewable natural gas (RNG) agreements with Kinetrex Energy and TruStar Energy. Together, these two contracts will supply UPS with up to 80 million gallon equivalents (GEs) of RNG over the terms of the agreements. The use of RNG is a very important part of UPS’... Read more →

SEAT presented at its Martorell facilities the all-new SEAT Leon compact. The company, a member of the Volkswagen Group, has invested more than €1.1 billion in fourth generation of the Leon to bring it to market with more efficient engines, next levels of connectivity and driving assistance, dynamism and eye-catching... Read more →

The results of a new analysis by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) show that, when combined with a trend toward higher methane leakage and combustion slip, there is no climate benefit from using liquefied natural gas (LNG) as a marine fuel—regardless of the engine technology. LNG is becoming... Read more →

Clean Energy Fuels Corp delivered 143 million gallons of Redeem Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) last year as robust sales of the carbon-neutral transportation fuel continued in 2019, closing out the year with significant deals throughout North America. Redeem was the first commercially available RNG vehicle fuel, derived from capturing biogenic... Read more →

Researchers at the University of Michigan, McGill University and McMaster University have developed a binary copper−iron catalyst for photoelectrochemical CO2 reduction toward methane. The work, presented in a paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), offers a unique, highly efficient, and inexpensive route for solar fuels synthesis.... Read more →

India’s Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Dharmendra Pradhan, launched India’s first long distance compressed natural gas (CNG) bus under a strategic program led by Indraprastha Gas Limited (IGL), the largest CNG distribution company in India. The launch ushers in CNG as the fuel of choice for long distance transportation... Read more →

Cummins Westport Inc. has received certifications from both the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and California Air Resources Board (ARB) for its B6.7N natural gas engine. Like the Cummins Westport ISX12N and L9N engines, the B6.7N meets California ARB optional Low NOx standard of 0.02 g/bhp-hr, a 90% reduction from... Read more →

Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) is seeking expressions of interest from firms which wish to enter into a commercial licensing arrangement to bring to market its methane oxidation catalyst. This technology has applications to the automotive industry and other sectors covered by regulations that control methane emissions. NRCan said the ideal... Read more →

The US. Department of Energy (DOE) selected 16 projects to receive nearly $25 million in federal funding for cost-shared projects to advance natural gas infrastructure technology development. DOE’s Office of Fossil Energy will provide federal funding for these projects. These projects aim to develop tools, methods, and technologies to enhance... Read more →

The California Air Resources Board (ARB) has recently posted six Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) Tier 2 pathways applications for the production of liquefied hydrogen from renewable and fossil gas. Shell Energy North America seeks certification of a renewable hydrogen pathway produced by steam methane reformation at Air Products &... Read more →

Primus Green Energy Inc., along with a global petrochemical company as a joint venture partner, has commissioned a Front End Engineering and Design (FEED) study with IHI E&C International Corporation for a first of its kind natural gas-to-gasoline plant in Texas. The proposed joint venture plant will be a scaled-up... Read more →

Researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and colleagues earlier developed an efficient process for methane pyrolysis. Methane pyrolysis separates methane (CH4) into gaseous hydrogen and solid carbon that is a valuable material for various industry branches and can also be stored safely. Now, KIT is partnering with industry... Read more →