Posted on 08/31/2012 8:27:03 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Would you pay $2.14 for a gallon of gas?
I know I would. According to AAA, the nationwide average for a gallon of gasoline is $3.80... Diesel is even more expensive at $4.06.
Yet despite high fuel costs across the country, a select group of drivers are paying only $2.14 a gallon... more than $1.50 below the national average.
What's the catch?
To be honest, there isn't one. These drivers aren't getting some "special deal," and this isn't some publicity stunt that's only available to a select few. They're simply filling up their tanks with a different kind of transportation fuel.
Let me explain...
During the past decade, new technologies like horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing have unlocked waves of natural gas reserves that were previously thought inaccessible. As a result, gas prices have plummeted to below $3 per thousand cubic feet (Mcf)... well below the 10-year high of $10.79 hit in 2008.
With natural gas prices hovering near record lows, companies across the board are looking for ways to take advantage of the new cheap energy source... and who better to benefit than the transportation industry?
All over the nation, companies with heavy transportation costs are introducing vehicles that run off natural gas into their regular operations. Just last year, UPS added 48 trucks that run off natural gas to its shipping fleet, which brings the total number of vehicles in its fleet running on natural gas to 1,100.
Right now, the compressed natural gas (CNG) equivalent to a gallon of gasoline costs on average $2.14. With over 110,000 natural-gas vehicles already diving on U.S. roads -- and CNG prices roughly $1.50 per gallon cheaper than gasoline -- the number of CNG vehicles on the road is going nowhere but up.
But while there's ample incentive for truck owners to switch from diesel to CNG, there's still one big obstacle: lack of infrastructure.
After all, you wouldn't want to be on a lonely stretch of highway somewhere on the outskirts of Omaha running on 'E' without a CNG station in sight.
CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE REST...
I’ll pay the higher price, thank you very much.
From what I’ve heard, the “natural gas burning car” hasn’t quite made the grade, yet....
For about a six week period from late June to early August I was paying $0.00 for gasoline. Coupons. Now that the coupons have expired I am bummed out having to pay for gas again. Hope I get another set of those coupons on steroids.
over 110,000 natural-gas vehicles already diving on U.S. roads
BTTT
Care to share what you’ve heard negative about NG fueled cars?
Aside from the cost to convert to CNG and the current scarcity of CNG fueling stations, I have not heard anything negative, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t negatives.
CNG fueled vehicles have been around for a long time. In Texas many companies were utilizing CNG fueled fleets back in the 60’s and are still going strong.
Technology has improved greatly in the past 10 years and CNG refueling stations are popping up everywhere in Texas and Oklahoma. Oklahoma is providing many incentives to either convert or purchase factory equipped cars and trucks.
BTW....little or no difference in fuel economy.
“From what I’ve heard, the “natural gas burning car” hasn’t quite made the grade, yet...”
Obviously there are many fleet vehicles running on CNG and you can even purchase a dual fuel conversion kit for “SOME” cars (thanks to insane rules for testing from the EPA the choice is not huge).
Dual fuel is what we need right now to allow more and more gas stations to be equipped with CNG filling units along with existing gasoline pumps.
In many areas, NY for example the State DOT would not allow us peons to fill up at their, errr excuse me OUR CNG filling stations but more and more independent stations are adding CNG options.
It is cleaner burning, more engine friendly, better cold weather starting and in fairness, it does require more physical space for fuel storage Mile/Mile compared to gasoline.
The technology exists to easily switch between gasoline and cng - supposedly a large number of taxis in Brazil are so equipped. This will of course increase the space dedicated to fuel tanks though.
Have road taxes been applied to that price yet?
How hasn’t CNG made the grade?
It is commercially viable right now, without subsidy.
Studies of truck fleets have found substantial savings in maintenance costs (it burns so clean, they can even extend the oil change interval).
There are aftermarket conversion kits...meaning the engine is unchanged, its just another version of fuel delivery.
CNG doesn’t suffer from limited range, or low power like electric. The only limitation is the availability of stations....which is why we have primarily seen the conversion in truck fleets only.
Europeans have been bolting on conversion kits for years, to combat wide swings in gas prices. It works better for them, since they don’t use cars for ‘road trips’ like we do (they use trains heavily subsidized with gas taxes). So, it works great for a daily driver, where you know you have a station nearby.
I really see very little downside...and the article states that (very quietly) 110,000 CNG vehicles have hit the road. Compare that with the much hyped electric vehicle fleet, which is a fraction of that.
Really, what have you ‘heard’ that is a downside to CNG vehicles?
I wasn't aware of a great increase in the tech; though I do remember seeing/using/fueling some GSA Diesel/CNG pickups (they could use either), I never got to see/use the CNG functionality as we only had Diesel at the fuel-point.
Maybe not for personal vehicles (not enough natural gas stations), but commercial vehicles...all the bugs are worked out.
Companies like UPS are going big into natural gas for their trucks. When enough do, it will reduce the demand for gasoline, reducing the cost.
And, they are doing it without federal govt support. If anything, the federal govt is getting in the way, because natural gas is at odds with Obama’s vision of electric vehicles.
Conservatives haven’t done a good enough job of getting this message out.
CNG is part of a solid alternative vision to the left’s unrealistic, utopian green energy vision.
The price gets much better than $2.14 if you have a fueling station at your house. The price ends up being between $0.30 and $0.60 per gallon equivelent.
My sister had a dual gas/CNG car for a while. It ran very well, and the changeover from CNG to gas (when the CNG tank was empty) was seamless.
Only fault I found, the CNG tank took up too much of the trunk space. She didn’t plan to use the trunk space, so no problem.
Somebody hit it, and she replaced it with a gasoline-only car.
Tests to measure the maximum horsepower of commercial vehicles converted for use with natural gas fuel indicate a reduction of approximately 20% in horsepower compared with gasoline-driven vehicles. This reduction in horsepower resulting from the use of gas is due basically to the lower thermal efficiency of the cycle of natural gas compared with that of gasoline and to its lower volumetric efficiency, since natural gas is injected into the combustion chamber in gaseous form, unlike gasoline, in which part of the fuel entering the cylinder is in the liquid phase. Natural gas used as a fuel generates lower quantities of air pollutants, particularly unburned hydrocarbons (HCs) and carbon monoxide (CO). Despite the downside of reduced horsepower, the use of natural gas as a fuel for automotive vehicles equipped with Otto-cycle engines is economically viable owing to the wide availability of natural gas.
Regular gas engines running on natural gas will only get about 50 percent fuel mileage versus running on gasoline. When they first started converting car engines to natural gas the cost of natural gas was about a third the price of regular gas. So even though you were using twice as much fuel you were still saving money. Now I think natural gas is about 50 to 65% the price of fuel so the savings isn't quite there.
Natural gas is still a good source of fuel for cars but the engine needs to be build for it. If the engine is set up for it right it will do a lot better as far as getting higher fuel mileage. From what I understand a proper setup for natural gas will get anywhere from 70 to 90% fuel mileage of a gas engine. It will also make more power.
Some other benefits to running natural gas is oil change intervals can be doubled and the spark plugs will last a long, long time. So you can save more money by having to pass less for maintenance.
Not true. Natural gas vehicles work great. Only limitation is total miles per tank which is about 180 miles for a Honda civic
The green energy guys really confuse me when it comes to vehicles.
I'm a big Diesel fan myself; until rather recently [Ultra-low sulfur requirements] Diesel was always cheaper than gasoline & I have an 1983 Oldsmobile that runs on Diesel and gets close to 40 MPG (38, last time I ran the numbers) -- so it actually pisses me off when I see these "great new technologically wonderful" [gasoline] cars that get 40MPG. -- Try getting that [in a big/heavy car] with ethanol. (And then there's Biodiesel, which works nearly as well as regular Diesel, but doesn't support/reinforce agriculture handouts from Congress.)
All that said, I'd like to be able to check out CNG; it sounds interesting.
It takes about $.50 per gallon to compress the gas in your garage with the $10,000 garage compressor. Also remember that cng contains only about 60% as much energy per gallon as gasoline. When you add it all up cng is more expensive then gasoline even at the current prices.
For this reason I've been thinking of converting my gasoline emergency generator to CNG. Keeping the gas fresh in that thing and the carburetor clean is a chore. Also, it'd sure be nice if I could also convert my big John Deere and couple other small engines (log splitter, ATV, etc.) to CNG since they tend to have the same seasonal chores associated with keeping the fuel system and carb clean over long winters.
I wonder if there's an under served market for CNG-powered lawn tools and other utility equipment.
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