French fuel supplier TotalEnergies Marine Fuels and Green Marine Bunkering have entered a memorandum of understanding on a joint development study on methanol as a new marine fuel in Singapore.
The two companies will study the feasibility to implement a viable methanol bunkering supply chain in the country.
Shipowners are increasingly interested in methanol as a marine fuel. Industry data showed methanol was the second most popular alternative fuel choice for new vessel orders in 2022.
TotalEnergies Marine Fuels claimed that, in the container ship segment, duel-fuelled methanol vessel orders had grown faster than all other orders. Just this week, Maersk ordered a sextet of 9,000 teu methanol dual-fuel containerships.
Methanol-fuelled vessels can use all types of methanol from grey methanol, more sustainable blue methanol, to carbon emission-neutral green methanol.
“This joint study is in line with our goal to offer our customers a suite of alternative sustainable fuels that will support the shipping industry’s decarbonization journey,” Louise Tricoire, vice president of TotalEnergies Marine Fuels, said.
TotalEnergies Marine Fuels joined the Methanol Institute last year to connect with the methanol ecosystem and identify opportunities for partnerships that will help advance and standardize the application of methanol as a marine fuel.
Currently, TotalEnergies produces approximately 700KT per year of methanol in Germany and is working on various projects related to low-carbon methanol technologies like e-CO2Met, a pilot project launched in June 2021 near TotalEnergies’ Leuna refinery in Germany, which will convert CO2 and renewable power into e-methanol.
