Posted on 04/14/2011 10:30:08 AM PDT by AJFavish
With Chrysler's soon-to-be-owner Fiat successfully selling natural-gas vehicles (NGVs) in Europe and South America, analysts have suggested that Chrysler would develop and sell natural-gas cars and trucks as one element of its green strategy.
Not 'til 2017?
Now the company has confirmed it. Bob Lee, Chrysler's vice president for engines and electrified propulsion systems, said Monday that, "the technology is very actively being worked on."
(Excerpt) Read more at greencarreports.com ...
They can do what they want, but I still prefer my cars to be made out of metal...
The list, ping
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What I would like to see, however, is other fuels made from Nat gas. There is a dozen uses for using Nat gas as a fuel base instead of compressing it to 6k lbs. What I think would help would be to decide on a fuel that could be made from oil, Nat Gas, or coal to use in motor vehicles and build cars to use that. Diesel comes to mind. The Nazi's had very little oil they didn't steal from other countries so they fought much of the war with coal fuels. I'm no expert, but I hear there are many fuels that can be made from Nat gas. With abundant Nat Gas and coal in the US, we would be energy independent.
That is my concern, basically, too, about NG used in personal vehicles: the nature of the fuel means a lot of pressure is required, and that means a lot of things could go wrong. Also, I think NG vehicles have less range per tankful than do gasoline vehicles.
I’d otherwise love an NG vehicle option, assuming, of course, that a decent nationwide fuel-delivery system can be brought online ...
my concern is that the retail fuel delivery system does not exist, and with this crowd you can be 110% sure it would get built with taxpayer money.
Most journalists and (self-anointed) environmentalists have no idea, whatsoever, how much is involved in engineering and implementing technological changes, for mass production. The time-frame seems reasonable.
Nat gas would work well for stationary engines like generators. You wouldn’t need storage but just connect to the utility. Most tanks of various gasses are rated at 3k and up. When a tank at 5k loses a connector, it is quite interesting for people close by. For 250 lbs, not so much. I’ve seen the tanks for CNG cars and most are Kevlar synthetics. Sorry, I would be scared to death in a crash. A metal tank rated at those pressures would be heavy and not able to hold enough gas to go very far. Then there still remains the possibility of catastrophic failure at the regulator. Course, LP gas pools at the ground and NG rises, there is always that. I was interested in this awhile back and Googled it. It seems Nat Gas is used for many products that we normally do not think comes from NG. Liquid fuels being one.
I would agree if this were new tech, but it is already used in much of the world. I would think 2013 or so would be enough time to adapt today’s cars and test them. It either works safely or why are we even discussing it?
Keep in mind you can buy a natural gas compressor and refill your car at home. With a multifuel conversion, natural gas and gasoline, you can buy which ever is cheapest at the time.
Of course with home fillups, you need to call the tax folks and figure out how to pay the road tax. I’m sure everyone with a home fill staion will do that otherwise the fuel would be really cheap instaed of just cheap.
But your point of price is my reason for not pursuing a propane powered vehicle, no real price savings.
Other fuels can be made from Natural Gas, as long as you want to pay gasoline or higher prices.
What’s going to happen to the price of natural gas when the federal government finds a way to outlaw hydraulic fracturing?
The City of Boston had one of their NG vehicles on display for the very first erf day. This is hardly new tech.
The nat-gas cars will have to be designed to accommodate the pressure tank and apparatus, without sacrificing the trunk.
The tank, and whole vehicle will have to undergo numerous crash tests. There can be no serious doubts about the safety. Product recalls would be very expensive. Lawsuits, maybe more so.
Then, there's the challenge of producing this vehicle at a reasonable cost.
Here in the City of San Diego buses have been running on natural gas [Compressed natural gas (CNG)]for years as they continue to phase out the diesel buses. Also, recently I’ve seen placards on those semi-automatic trash trucks (Waste Management) proclaiming how their big trash trucks now run on CNG.
Ford already did that. It wasn’t too many years ago that you could buy a multifuel car or light truck from Ford. Many of the gas companies around here had them.
The Honda travels just as far with CNG as if it was gasoline powered.
The following was copied from http://www.altfuels.org/backgrnd/altftype/cng.html
Compressed natural gas is like liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) in many ways, only more so. It is very easy on the engine, giving longer service life and lower maintenance costs. CNG is the least expensive alternative fuel (except electricity) when you compare equal amounts of fuel energy, and, in my experience at least, its price has been relatively steady (except for one big jump when California utility regulators changed the rules!). At the peak of the big gasoline price run-up in April, 1996, I was paying half as much for a gasoline-gallon-equivalent of 130-octane natural gas as I would have paid for a gallon of 92-octane unleaded gasoline! Even with the natural-gas price spikes of the last few years, I have found the price of CNG to be less volatile, and on average lower, than that of gasoline.
"The high octane rating of natural gas allows the CNG-powered Honda Civic GX to use a very high compression ratio and produce more power than stock gasoline versions. My own van has a stock compression ratio and about 10% lower power output than the gasoline version with the same-size engine, but I get significantly better fuel economy on the open road because the high octane rating of the fuel allows timing and mixture to be adjusted for more efficiency without causing detonation ("knocking"). And, as with LPG, because the fuel tanks have to withstand such enormous internal pressures, they are incredibly tough, with good results for safety. In addition, because natural gas is lighter than air and has very narrow flammability limits, if a leak develops it is very likely that the fuel will dissipate harmlessly into the air without causing a danger of ignition or explosion."
the shame of it is the 6 year delay - no reason for that. That's six more years of our money going to the Sand Countries and that nut in Venezuela
My concern runs more to the mundane. Daimler-Benz climbed into bed with Chrysler and the celebrated Benz QC went to hell. If Honda touches that tar baby, will their vaunted quality and dependability go the same way? I’m driving my 9th Honda since 1976, so you know where my loyalty and my concern lie. sd
once again the “real private sector” is beaing the crap out of govenment favored programs - http://srcreman.com/ this company, springfield remanufacturing, is providing natural gas Postal trucks - rebuilt 100% american made!!
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