GENA Solutions: Total renewable and low-carbon methanol project pipeline rises from 61 to 61.6 Mt by 2031

The Methanol Institute recently shared with Manifold Times the renewable and low-carbon methanol project pipeline May 2026 release produced by GENA Solutions Oy.

Information from the release is meant to provide the bunkering publication’s readers with insight on renewable methanol availability, and to assist the maritime industry in the adoption of methanol as a mainstream marine fuel heading into IMO 2030/2050.

Key takeaways from GENA’s May 2026 Methanol release are as follows:

• A biomethanol project in China signed an EPC contract in May. GENA estimates that more than 3 Mt of biomethanol and e-methanol capacity is currently under construction in China.
• Six new projects were added to Project Navigator, while five frozen projects were excluded. The project pipeline increased by 0.6 Mt month on month.
• Project Navigator tracks 282 renewable and low-carbon methanol projects, representing 61.6 Mt of capacity by 2031, including 24.9 Mt of e-methanol, 25.6 Mt of biomethanol, and 11.2 Mt of low-carbon methanol.
• GENA estimates that renewable methanol capacity could grow from 0.9 Mt in 2025 to 1.5 Mt by the end of 2026, 2.2–2.4 Mt in 2027, and 5-12 Mt in 2030.
• Europe accounts for more than 10 Mt of renewable and low-carbon methanol projects, about 79% of which use hydrogen as one of the feedstocks.
• More than 31 Mt of projects are under development in China, with biomass gasification accounting for 61% of the pipeline.
• North America accounts for more than 10 Mt of projects, mainly using CCS.

Note: The full article can be viewed here.

Photo credit: GENA Solutions
Published: 2 June, 2026