Mitsubishi Gas Chemical Company (MGC), Kokuka Sangyo Co., and Hanshin Diesel Works, have announced the completion of Kokuryu Maru, a chemical tanker that will also serve as a methanol bunkering vessel. In a statement issued today (26 September), the companies also confirmed that the vessel, Kokuka Sangyo’s first dedicated methanol-fuelled ship, had been fuelled with methanol for the first time. The bunkering operation, which took place on Wednesday at Kinoe Port, involved biomethanol, produced domestically at MGC’s Niigata Plant, through the mass balance method. The 1,223 DWT vessel, which is equipped with a methanol-fuelled main engine ordered by Kokuka Sangyo […]

Global commodity traders Mercuria and Glencore have each pledged $500 million to VaultCo, an initiative that was created earlier this year as Project Vault by the Export-Import Bank of the United States (EXIM) to safeguard U.S. industry’s access to critical minerals ‘during periods of supply disruption or market dislocation.’ EXIM’s board greenlighted a $10 billion loan for Project Vault in early February in tandem with a $2 billion investment from the private sector. As explained by EXIM in February, ‘Project Vault establishes the U.S. Strategic Critical Minerals Reserve, an independently governed public-private partnership that will store essential raw materials in […]

In an open letter to the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, 170 companies working across the European energy sector have argued that any removal of mandates and targets for the use of renewable fuels of non-biological origins (RFNBO) as set out in the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) III ‘would waste six years of work and send shockwaves through the market, punishing first movers and creating a lack of confidence in EU climate and energy policies.’ In the revised RED III, in relation to hydrogen, demand is to be lifted by the directive through a binding combined […]