Transport minister bats for methanol-based fuel

Nitin Gadkari, the minister for Road Transport, Highways & Shipping, has stated that this is the appropriate time for India to evolve into a methanol-based economy. The minister was speaking at the inaugural session of an international seminar on ‘India’s Leap into Methanol Economy’ in the capital yesterday.

Gadkari expressed his happiness that the NITI Aayog had taken an initiative for developing methanol as an alternative source of energy, for which innovation, technology and research would be the keys. 

The minister said that it is possible to convert waste to wealth. He cited his experience in Nagpur where municipal waste was converted to fuel and also sold bringing profits to the local government body. He informed the audience how the waste was converted into bio-CNG and how 50 buses are being run in Nagpur on this source of energy. 

Import-free petroleum country

The Road Transport minister further said that adopting methanol as an alternative source of energy can help bring about socio-economic change in the country, as it would considerably bring down the fuel import bill.

“Surplus fund could be diverted in developing the rural economy. As rural areas are a source of feedstock for methanol, it would provide additional income and also become a source of livelihood for rural folks.”

Gadkari said that rice straw is burnt in many parts of the country causing pollution. Instead, this could be used for making methanol, pointing out that the North East is rich in bamboo, which can be used for preparing methanol.

Need to reduce import bill

Earlier, the Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Dharmendra Pradhan said that there was a great demand for fuel in the rural economy as motorcycles are quickly replacing bicycles. He also said that the country needs to reduce its present import bill of Rs 450,000 crore and methanol could help in that direction. 

The CEO of Methanol Institute of USA, Greg Dolan said that India’s priority should be to look for cleaner and sustainable fuel. He added that methanol was convenient to manufacture, transport and store. Besides transportation, methanol can be used for industrial boilers, for cooking and also for manufacturing numerous other products. 

During the conference, an Agreement of Statement of Intent was signed between NITI Aayog and Methanol Institute of USA. 

What is methanol fuel?

Alcohol fuels have been used widely in transportation ever since the invention of the internal combustion engine, and continue to be employed today as an alternative to petrol derived from oil. When Henry Ford first pioneered the production of automobiles in the United States, he created engines designed to run on either petrol or alcohol fuels. It was only with the wide-spread introduction of cheap petrol that alcohol fuels were tabled in favor of optimizing engines to run on petrol.

Methanol is an ideal fuel for transportation in large part because of its efficient combustion and low cost compared to all other fuels. When combusted, reformulated petrol produces a number of harmful and toxic byproducts that are reduced or eliminated by replacement with methanol.

Emissions of unburned carbons and carbon monoxide are much lower when consuming methanol fuel, and methanol also greatly reduces NO_x emissions as well. Methanol also burns with almost no particulate matter – which can lead to respiratory problems like asthma. Emissions from methanol fuel are also less reactive, and create less ground-level ozone and smog.

Methanol is a high octane fuel that enables very efficient and powerful engine performance. Engines optimised for methanol could provide an energy based efficiency gain of 50% over a standard (port fuel injected, non-turbo) petrol engine in a light duty vehicle. The power-producing qualities of methanol are well-known and it is used in several professional and amateur racing sanctioning organisations in the USA.  

But you can't simply put pure methanol fuel in your car today. At high levels, methanol fuel is corrosive to certain materials commonly used in engines and fuel lines. In order to be able to operate on high-level blends like M-85 (a mixture of 85% methanol and 15% petrol), small modifications must be made to an engine to include methanol-compatible components. 

These modifications generally cost less than 0.5% the cost of a new automobile. Low-level blends of methanol though do not cause adverse effects to a car's engine and can be used in cars today where the fuel is available without any adverse effect  Methanol is used as a denaturant for ethanol fuel in many countries, and some amounts of methanol are combusted with those blends everyday. (Info courtesy methanol.org).

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