E-Methanol Producer Liquid Wind Enters Bankruptcy Administration
In a blow for green shipping, the e-fuel maker Liquid Wind AB has entered bankruptcy administration and will be sold off, raising questions about the future of its methanol plant project pipeline. The industry already faces a supply shortage, and it is as-yet unclear where adequate quantities of e-fuels will come from in order to power shipping's green transition.
Liquid Wind is a specialist in e-methanol, an energy storage process that takes renewable energy and uses it to create a physical commodity - a liquid fuel, suitable for running an internal combustion engine. It is particularly suitable for hard-to-abate industries like shipping, where high energy density and long endurance between refueling stops are fundamental requirements.
The process requires a source of CO2; if the CO2 is derived from biomass combustion, the resulting product is fossil-free and net carbon-neutral. Liquid Wind has six different combined heat and power projects in its sights, each offering a plentiful stream of biogenic CO2 which could be captured and turned into methanol (using plenty of electricity, clean water and a bit of chemistry). It had hoped to have 10 projects under way by 2030, each producing about 100,000 tonnes of green methanol annually; given the low gravimetric energy density of methanol, the output of each plant would be enough to run one ULCV container ship for roughly 125-250 days of steaming, depending upon speed.
On Monday, Liquid Wind was declared bankrupt, and its management was handed to a court-appointed trustee. The entirety of the business is up for sale, including its Finnish and Swedish subsidiaries. The firm did not provide further details.
The bankruptcy comes despite many notable successes - partnerships with major industrial brands like Alfa Laval and Siemens Energy, a successful $44 million equity raise, project sponsorship from the Swedish Energy Agency, and financing from big names like Samsung Ventures and Uniper.
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Just days before the announcement, Liquid Wind had submitted its environmental permit application for a project at a combined heat and power plant at Ornskoldsvik. The new e-methanol facility was designed to take biogenic CO2 from a biomass-fueled powerplant on the waterfront, output e-methanol, and provide district heating to nearby buildings using the waste heat from the process. The fuel for the powerplant comes mostly from forest industry waste products, and the electricity would come from nearby renewable-energy projects.
"With strong local collaboration and integration with Ovik Energi’s CHP plant, we can deliver locally produced volumes of sustainable eMethanol—especially in sectors where alternatives are still limited and reliance on imported fossil fuels remains high," said founder and then-chief executive Claes Fredriksson on May 5.
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