Geely to press on with methanol-powered vehicles despite risk of failure, founder says
- Geely’s unit CRI is designing the world’s largest plant with a capacity to produce 110,000 tons of low-carbon intensity methanol per year in Henan province
- Methanol fuel could boost China’s energy independence and help the nation’s drive toward carbon-neutrality by 2060
Zhejiang-based Geely, among a small number of carmakers developing methanol-powered vehicles, is testing methanol-fuelled taxis in some western Chinese cities as well as developing methanol-powered trucks at its commercial vehicles unit.
The private holding group, which owns Volvo Cars and a 9.7 per cent stake in German carmaker Daimler AG, has also invested in an Icelandic company called Carbon Recycling International (CRI) to work on technologies to produce methanol using carbon dioxide that will help lower overall carbon emissions.
“We will keep exploring methanol vehicle technologies,” Reuters reported, citing Li as saying at an industry conference in the western city of Chongqing on Sunday. “Of course it might fail in the end, but currently we are still working on it.” Li, who is the chairman of the group he founded in 1986, did not elaborate on the project.
The plant is owned by Geely Tech, a unit under Geely Zhejiang Holdings. Other investors are Shuncheng group, Shunju, Shunfeng and MFE Shanghai.