There is a certain poetry in holding the Annual General Meeting of the Swiss Power-to-X Collaborative Innovation Network (SPIN) in a place dedicated to the history of the automobile. On 22 May 2026, members and guests gathered at the Emil Frey Classic Center in Safenwil — a venue where the past, present, and future of mobility share the same roof — for a day of strategy, science, and shared fascination with how energy moves the world.
A welcome from Hannes Gautschi
The day opened with a warm welcome from Hannes Gautschi, Managing Director of the Classic Center, who took the audience through the story of the venue itself.
Officially called Classic Center Schweiz and operated by Emil Frey Classics AG, the centre is a competence hub for classic vehicles housed in a carefully restored former textile factory at Bahnhofplatz 2 in Safenwil — extended with a new building constructed in the same architectural style. It opened in 2015 as an expression of the Emil Frey Group’s long-standing fascination with automobiles and technical innovation.
Under one roof, the Classic Center combines an event hall, café bar, museum, archive, workshop, and trading floor. The Classic Car Competence Center offers classic car sales, maintenance and restoration, supervised vehicle storage, and transport and logistics services. Its museum features design icons such as the Jaguar E-Type, the Toyota 2000 GT, and the Aston Martin DB4 Vantage — cars that remind visitors how powerfully an engine and a body, well-designed together, can move people both physically and emotionally.
There was a fitting connection to SPIN’s own agenda: in 2022, Hannes Gautschi gave a talk at the Swiss Venture Club on “Modern Drivetrain Technologies (Hybrid, Electric, Hydrogen) — Today and Tomorrow” — a clear point of contact with the Power-to-X community. A more recent extension of the Classic Center in Zurich at Utoquai 55, with a small exhibition space for four vehicles and a classic café, shows how the format continues to evolve.
Keynote: Christian Bach on sustainable fuels
The welcome was followed by the keynote already covered in our previous post: Christian Bach (Empa, co-coordinator of the SWEET reFuel.ch consortium) on the theme “Synthetic fuels won’t just come — we have to go get them.” Bach laid out the case for an active Swiss strategy to secure sustainable fuel imports, presented the staged Oman project initiative, and made transparent both the economic challenges and the policy instruments needed to close the gap to fossil parity.
The talk set a productive tone for the formal part of the day — grounded in numbers, honest about open questions, and clear about where industry commitment is now the binding constraint.
The statutory General Assembly
The formal General Assembly was chaired by Patrik Meli, Managing Director of Everllence Switzerland, who guided members efficiently through the agenda and the strategic discussion.
All members of the Executive Board were re-elected for another term — a strong vote of confidence in the current leadership and the direction SPIN has taken over the past period. The continuity is welcome, given the momentum building behind several key initiatives.
At the same time, the Assembly had to acknowledge a resignation from the Board of one member from Romandie. We thank our departing colleague warmly for the time, expertise, and energy contributed to SPIN, and the seat now stands open.
This vacancy is also an opportunity. SPIN is actively looking for proposals to fill the position and would particularly welcome a female candidate with a strong network in Romandie. Strengthening our presence and partnerships in the French-speaking part of Switzerland is a strategic priority: the energy transition is a national project, and the Power-to-X community must reflect that geographic and cultural breadth if it wants to be effective. We are convinced that closer collaboration with Romandie-based stakeholders — research institutions, industrial players, utilities, and cantonal authorities — will substantially enrich the network.
If you know someone who could be a good fit, or if you would like to put yourself forward, please get in touch with us at info@power-to-x.swiss. We are open to suggestions and happy to have a confidential first conversation.
A new book on the politics behind mobility
A particular highlight of the day was the presentation of Peter Metzinger’s new book, published in both German (“Im Namen des Klimas”) and English (“In The Name of Climate”) and available on Amazon in both editions. Metzinger, Co-Managing Director of SPIN, used the platform to introduce the book to members and explain its core thesis.
The book investigates how a California-steered, partly Chinese-co-financed think tank network succeeded in shaping the dominant narrative around mobility and climate policy in Europe — a narrative in which every electric vehicle is presented as “green” regardless of the electricity mix that actually powers it, and every combustion engine is labelled “fossil” even when it runs on renewable fuels.
It is a non-fiction read for anyone who wants to understand what actually happens behind the scenes of policy-making and administration in Brussels — and, increasingly, in Switzerland. For a Power-to-X audience, the relevance is obvious: the regulatory frameworks that will determine whether renewable fuels and synthetic molecules find a viable market are being shaped right now, often on the basis of assumptions that do not survive a careful technology-neutral analysis. Metzinger’s book offers a well-researched look at how those assumptions were manufactured.
A walk through automotive history
After the formal proceedings, members were invited to tour the museum and workshop. What followed was, for many, the emotional highlight of the day: an immersion into the history of automobility in Switzerland and worldwide, guided by people who clearly love what they do.
The exhibits told a story that resonates with anyone working on the next energy transition. The early decades of the automobile were defined by a sense of newly won freedom — the freedom to move, to explore, to connect places and people that had previously been separated by distance and effort. That fascination is still tangible in the polished bodywork, the hand-finished interiors, and the elegantly engineered mechanics on display.
It is a useful reminder for those working on Power-to-X: every successful energy transition in history has ultimately been about expanding human possibility, not just substituting one molecule for another or a molecule by electrons.
Conversation, ideas, and momentum
The day closed in the most SPIN way possible — over food and drinks, with members and guests exchanging perspectives, sparking new ideas, and discovering unexpected points of collaboration. Several conversations began that will almost certainly turn into concrete next steps in the coming months.
SPIN Perspective
A General Assembly is, on paper, an administrative obligation. In practice — when it is done well — it is one of the most valuable instruments an association has. It is the moment when the network looks at itself, agrees on direction, and renews the relationships that turn an organisation chart into a working community.
This year’s gathering at the Emil Frey Classic Center did exactly that. The venue itself made a quiet but powerful point: mobility has always been a story of innovation, infrastructure, and the courage to build something new before all the answers are known. The same will be true for the Power-to-X economy that SPIN exists to advance.
Our thanks go to Hannes Gautschi and the entire team at the Classic Center for their hospitality, to Patrik Meli for chairing the Assembly, to Christian Bach for a substantive and honest keynote, and to all members and guests who made the day what it was.
The work continues — and the next chapter of Swiss mobility will not write itself.