Researchers at USC say methanol derived from natural gas is a better alternative than hydrogen for powering fuel cells.
The researchers are developing a reforming process that eliminates the need to convert methane into a syngas before turning it into a liquid fuel. Researchers also believe that in the future hydrogen could be converted to methanol using renewable energy, which would avoid hydrogen's storage problems.
Realistically, methanol production would rely on fossil fuels (defeating much of the purpose), but also if we are going to use natural gas in vehicles, why convert it all? There are clean LNG or CNG vehicles on the market today, so I'm not seeing any reason to get psyched about methanol.
