Boosting energy security

Methanol production should be promoted

The initiative by the NITI (National Institution for Transforming India) Aayog to promote the production and use of methanol as transportation and cooking fuel is a positive move that can serve both the energy- and environment-related objectives in one go. Methanol is a cost-effective, non-polluting and versatile fuel that can fully or partially replace petrol, diesel or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and, in the process, reduce India’s dependence on energy imports. Unlike ethanol, made largely from plant-based sources, such as sugarcane and vegetable oil, which a land-constrained country like India can ill-afford, methanol can be derived from a variety of renewable, non-renewable and abundantly available feedstock. These include agricultural biomass, urban solid waste, coal, natural gas and, significantly, even carbon dioxide (CO2) present in the air. If about 20 per cent of the country’s crude oil imports are substituted by locally generated and relatively cheaper methanol, as suggested by the NITI Aayog, vehicular pollution can be slashed by 40 per cent, besides saving considerable cost.

India’s potential to produce methanol is huge as it has over 125 billion tonnes of proven coal reserves, about 500 million tonnes of biomass (generated annually), and substantial quantities of stranded natural gas, some of which is flared up. Many countries have gone far ahead in utilising methanol as a source of energy. India must strive to catch up. China, the world’s largest exploiter of methanol, has replaced about 10 per cent vehicular fuel with methanol produced mostly from coal. The US, several European countries, and Australia are among the major users of methanol. Thankfully, the government seems keen to implement its think tank’s proposal in this regard. This is clear from transport minister Nitin Gadkari’s announcement in Parliament that the government, by developing methanol as an indigenous fuel, intends to trim the crude oil import bill by 10 per cent by 2022. Interestingly, the Indian Railways is evaluating the idea of converting its entire fleet of 6,000 diesel engines to methanol-operated locomotives at a cost of Rs 10 million per engine. This could cut down the railways’ energy bill by half. A prototype of a methanol engine is said to be ready.

However, the downside of such an ambitious methanol programme cannot be disregarded, even if it is technically feasible to overcome it. Though methanol-powered vehicles are almost totally non-polluting, a large amount of CO2, a potent polluter, is emitted during the process of making methanol from coal. This will need to be either captured and stored or used to co-generate power in methanol plants or, better still, recycled into methanol, as some countries are doing with CO2 spewed by steel plants. However, the technology for this purpose needs further refinement and scaling up. This aside, internal combustion engines now can accept methanol-doping of only up to 15 per cent with minimal modification. Higher levels of blending will require changes in engine design. But since the overall gains from the use of methanol outweigh the cost of surmounting the drawbacks, the government should go ahead with promoting methanol to add a new dimension to the country’s energy security.