The Kneeslider

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New GM and Chrysler Pickups May Expand Demand for Natural Gas Refueling

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Dodge RAM with dual fuel – gasoline and CNG

While everyone is waiting for some battery breakthrough to push electric vehicles into the mainstream, GM and Chrysler just announced upcoming bi-fuel pickup trucks, that could have an impact of a different sort. These new pickups won’t use ethanol as their alternate fuel, it will be compressed natural gas and this could be a big deal. While there already are a lot of heavy duty trucks and buses running on natural gas, these new models will be the commercial pickups used by smaller operators, many of which may not have quite the natural gas refueling infrastructure in place of the average bus fleet. Though they can’t yet depend on publicly available natural gas stations, these pickups may ramp up demand for an expansion of those facilities.

Natural gas has a huge advantage over electricity for powering vehicles, you don’t need any new cutting edge breakthrough to make it practical, all of the internal combustion engines we already have can be adapted to run on it. For instance, the engine in the new Ram pickup:

… has been modified to run on compressed natural gas as well as gasoline. Redesigned cylinder heads with specifically designed CNG compatible valves and valve-seat materials allow the engine to burn both fuels. It also gets a second, CNG-specific fuel rail and set of injectors. New spark plugs improve combustion and durability, and a new powertrain control module allows the HEMI to seamlessly operate on either of the two fuel sources.

In other words, once modified, it can simply and cleanly run on either fuel.

Natural gas burns more cleanly than either gasoline or diesel fuel, is far less expensive and, here in the USA, we have enormous reserves of it. The pipelines to distribute it are already in place, the last piece necessary to make it a viable fuel for everyday use is an infrastructure of refueling stations, and that’s where these pickups can make a difference. Other than Honda, who has been manufacturing the Civic GX powered exclusively by natural gas, there are no production vehicles available to the general public that run on CNG. As the number of these vehicles increase, the demand for those stations also increases and as the infrastructure grows, more vehicles will become available.

There are already scooters and small motorcycles in Asia that run on CNG, but none over here that I’m aware of. Whether it would make sense to convert motorcycles with internal combustion engines to natural gas or design them from the start to run on both gasoline and natural gas is open to debate, but refueling has been a question that may begin to go away. Home refueling stations are available for overnight refueling, and though there is an expense when installing the equipment, if all of your vehicles are CNG, you can share the equipment among them.

We talked about this before on The Kneeslider, and there was a wide range of opinions expressed, but I think CNG is a great alternative to current options, and unlike the ever coming, just around the corner, soon to be here, one breakthrough away, electric vehicles, natural gas is here now if we would just get down to the business of using it.

Posted on Filed Under: Alternative Fuels, Engines

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Comments

  1. In Italy the number of cars that run on natural gas are *relativaly* high. Fiat offers several models that run on both Natural Gas and petrol and which can be switched between them just with a button. Gas Stations that offer CNG aren’t that common although every medium sized town has at least one. Still, since you always have the possiblity of swithcing to petrol there’s never the fear of being stuck. Only inconvenience is you have to carry 2 fuel tanks around…

  2. Natural gas has a lot going for it as a motor fuel — relatively cheap and abundant, efficient and clean, and it works in gasoline or diesel engines. However, those engines work best if they are designed from the outset to burn NG. Adapting a gas or diesel engine to burn NG yields a pretty good engine, but one that doesn’t take advantage of its best qualities. Not sure if it would be practical for motorcycles; can the “tank” be made small enough to hold sufficient fuel for practical riding yet still be compact enough so it wouldn’t require a sidecar to hold it? But NG is a definite player in the alternative-fuel sweepstakes. A liquid-fuel vehicle can be converted and will work quite well if not up to full potential.

    I wonder about using it as a racing fuel? Any ideas or experiences out there?

    The biggest fly in the ointment that I can see is that NG is a fossil fuel, subject to the same market forces as oil-based fuels. Big Oil would control extraction, processing and distribution, and Wall Street would run up the prices through the usual means of buying and selling futures based on fear and emotion, not actual availability.

    Still, it’s worth a try. I’d install a fueling station in my garage and convert my pickup to run on NG if I could see a solid return on the investment and reliable savings going forward.

    • One of the advantages of cng is that it dent need to need to be processed. It’s good from the ground.

      • Travis, you are mistaken if you believe that NG can be used straight from the ground. After working in the oilfield since 1976, I can assure you that many times raw NG comes with saltwater, hydrogen sulfide, sulphur and occasionally crude oil contaminents. These all have to be removed prior to using NG as a fuel.

    • Here in brazil we regularly use gnv as fuel, my car is a vw polo 1.6l 104cv i use 2 cylinders of 7m3 of capacity, and my runing cost is half of if i use gasoline . gnv is the best alternative even better than diesel witch here cost less than gasoline to buy and run but the pickup truks that are the only one permited to use are hugely expensive to buy due to tax, so only riche people can buy leaving gnv as the alternative to blue collar guys to save same money, infraestructure are well served on the large cities. the only drawback in gnv is the size of the tanks in my car (small hatch) i lost 3/5 of trunk space and that because i use 2 very small tanks (120 km of autonomy) one in top of the other.
      Here we also had a racing series of pickup trucks that run on gnv alone. But most governamental investments in alternate fuel is only concentrate in etanol wich we use since the ´80s.

  3. Not only utilitarian, these vehicles can be a thing of beauty as well. I refer to the “Magnolia Special” roadster, hand built by a former honcho at Confederate Cycles. It was built in a garage in New Orleans, and uses a Jaguar engine and lots of aluminum bodywork. He and his co-pilot buddy recently drove it coast to coast with no significant problems, other than the Natural Gas infrastructure mentioned in your article.

      • “History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.” – Mark Twain.
        One hundred years ago, a similar conversation was taking place. Proponents of steam, petroleum, and electricity were all vying for dominance. It was H. Nelson Jackson who drove from coast to coast first in a gasoline powered 1903 Winton, cementing petroleum as the fuel of the future. One man altered the trajectory of the modern world by establishing a record for others to beat. Real competition, in the field, not in the smoke filled back rooms of Washington. You know the AMERICAN way of moving the ball down the field. The coast to coast record for alternative energy vehicles now stands at 89 hours, and is waiting for you to break it. — JT

    • As I said in the post:

      “Other than Honda, who has been manufacturing the Civic GX powered exclusively by natural gas …”

  5. Any American who does not have a re-election to campaign for and posesses reasonable intelligence would see cng as the only viable fuel for the immediate future. The adsorbed method would be the best for motor vehicles.

    • I see CNG as more of a “plan B” fuel. As long as gasoline remains plentiful, the main demand for NG will come from fleet operators looking to keep costs down. However, should we suddenly find ourselves in another oil crisis, the ability to quickly retrofit existing gasoline-powered vehicles to bi-fuel would offer us a relatively easy way to cope.

      Electric vehicles will also have a role to play, but electric retrofits are more difficult and expensive. For the most part electrification would proceed at the pace of fleet turnover. For those EV owners who don’t install their own renewable power source, the additional grid power used to charge their vehicles will most likely come from NG as well.

      The next few years should bring an interesting competition between CNG and electricity to build out viable vehicle refueling infrastructure. The electric vehicle makers such as Nissan and Tesla have announced plans to install fast-charger networks, while NG producer Chesapeake Energy is trying to drive up demand by rolling out a complete fueling station kit:
      http://energy.aol.com/2012/03/07/another-natural-gas-fueling-station-boost/?icid=related2

  6. one of my plans previously was to mate a NG generator conversion to my old 250cc bike. Wonder if I could do it as easily on my 500?

    Now my only issue… If I dent a tank on the bike, thats no problem right now. If you dent a CNG tank, thats a big problem, and it shouldnt be used until its replaced or fixed.

    • Those tanks are a lot tougher than people think. Check the video at the end of the post I wrote before about CNG.

      • Just watched it. While to does show that they are indeed tough against impact, they show nothing on abrasion.

        My concern isnt about explosions or something, its about a tip over that while it may cause cosmetic issues to a standard motorcycle, on a CNG tank mounted in a similar way, there would be concern that would send it out for hydrostatic testing before it could be safely filled again.

        Im still for the idea, those are just my concerns. Heck, I would be converting an engine for this tomorrow if i could find an economical kit for it, perfect for my back and forth commute.

      • There are also research people that have been working on absorbant catalysts that would help lower the storage pressures and control the rate of release to mitigate the possibility of explosion. There has been such a catalyst for hydrogen since the early 1970’s.

  8. yes, yes and yes. Everyone seems to be focused on electric, but ng is the way to got to bridge the gap. The US has CRAZY amounts of it, and it would be a great way to get from all fossil fuel-electric in the next 50 years.

    I imagine my self in 30 years (I’m 30) being the old guy on the block who still insists on firing up his old 1974 honda and 2002 triumph and taking them around the block a few times with the 30 dollar a gallon gasoline he had to special order.

  9. Welcome to the past century!
    CNG it is been used successfully pretty much everywhere in the world for decades now. It only has one problem: It’s cheap! Lobbyists for oil companies will never allow the use of it.
    Hector

  10. Public relations being what it is, I can’t get over the implication from Chrysler that this is an entirely groundbreaking thing for them to have done. My 1995 Dodge Ram pickup truck was available with a CNG option straight from the factory, and many US government fleets that purchased the RAM pickups and vans took advantage of it. Go to any autopparts web site, enter 1995 as the model year, Ram 1500 as the model, and when the powertrain selector comes up, you’ll have three choices – 5.2 L gasoline, 5.7 L gasoline, and 5.2L CNG. Geeky type that I am, I’ve considered getting the parts – which are still available in the Chrysler parts system — and converting mine. Using what we already have a great deal of for fuel makes good sense, and clearly the engineering differences can’t be that extraordinary if my stone ax truck could be run on NG. Anyone know where there’s a CNG filling station in Central Maryland? 😉

  11. We’ve had NG/dual fuel vehicles in NZ for decades, starting in late 70s. There’s infrastructure through out the country with LPG (Liquified Petroleum Gas – i.e. compressed butane/propane) available at service stations. Popularity has declined steeply. Costs might be low but mileage is very low. Also:

    “Petrol and LPG prices have changed dramatically over the last few years. Petrol reached new price-highs, then rapidly dropped to almost affordable prices. LPG also more than doubled in price, but while it has dropped a little it has yet to match the decreases in petrol prices.
    “This means it can cost more to run a vehicle on LPG than on petrol, which of course means it would be silly to convert.
    “Even if you have converted to LPG, every ten years you must have an expensive tank recertification check. This typically costs around $500, which may also mean the savings on LPG are not worthwhile.”
    (http://www.consumer.org.nz/reports/lpg-vs-petrol)

  12. I’ve owned a LNG equipped pickup …. bought it used from the local utility in the 80’s …. there is a reason the local gas company got rid of them……….. BTW there is a difference between CNG … LNG and LPG… not the same energy content per kg (2.2 lb for you yanks).

    However … the upside of a liquified gas prepared engine is that you can make your own fuel….

    Look up Downdraft Gassifier or Wood Gas …. I worked on a project that converted scrap wood mixed with crop stubble, contaminated cereal grains (mold infected) and land fill (litterally scooped straight out of a landfill) … cooked it into a combustible gas that produced about 50% energy of pure natural gas.

    Now … it isnt free …. but once you are set up the power requirements to operate a gassifier and compressor/bottling operation are not a deal breaker.

    The biggest problem you will have is regulators … stay below the radar of your government busybodies and you can avoid gas pumps for as long as you want.

    • BTW … one of the machinists I work with bought an old ford f150 with propane/gasoline dual fuel conversion … paid 200 bucks for it … replaced the head gasket and pan pickup… refilled the motor with synthetic. Total investment … about 650 bucks after redoing the brakes and misc. rubber parts.
      He’s driven it to work now for over two years … nearly every day
      He uses the propane to commute in the city and gasoline to go to the lake on weekends.

    • As early as 1942 VW had a number of Kubelwagens and Beetles (Kdf Wagen) running around on wood gas. Porsche also designed and built systems for field conversions of tanks and other military vehicles. The term is “Holzbrenner” and it would be cool to find one of the VWs…

      -todd

      • You bet Todd … but I think that they were running with the gassifier installed right on the vehicle. Way too cumbersome.
        We need a compressed gas powered vehicle and a self contained gassifier and gas bottling station … here in Winnipeg we can also heat our homes with it while making the gas.

  13. I’m surprised that the US government would let people refuel vehicles from their household natural gas supply. Most governments around the world would never let this happen, because it means that you avoid paying fuel excise. One of the main reasons that domestic natural gas is far cheaper than petrol is because there is no excise on it. I know that the US government doesn’t charge very much tax on vehicle fuels, but in Australia the tax makes up more than half the pump price, and even more in Europe.

  15. As an assistant fleet manager for a quasi municipal fleet, I am constantly being badgered by the proponents of CNG.
    I see a lot of potential here but. All of the proponents out there never talk numbers.
    The tell you it’s cheaper than the fuels we already have in use, but they never tell you how much.
    They tell you that the mileage is comparable but I can tell you that is BS. We have CNG buses and comparable Diesel units of the same year and size, the diesel units get double the MPG of the CNG units.
    They tell you that maintenance costs go down, BS again, spark plugs alone have to be changed more often than the manufacturer recommends and they are about 50 to 70 bucks a piece (for this application) Sensors go bad and they are costly, much more than those found on gas engines, fuel tanks have to be inspected.
    The proponents don’t tell you that by law, infrastructural upgrades to your maintenance facilities because the NFPA requirements are much more stringent for facilities that maintain or store vehicles that run on gaseous fuels.
    They tell you how abundant it is, but the only give you vague numbers on the cost of setting up fueling stations.
    As I said, there is a lot of potential here but you need to remember that the big proponents are out to sell gas at a profit. If they were really concerned, there would be a big effort to convert all of those oil heated homes throughout the northern US to NG and that ain’t happening.
    Sorry for my Dogmatic attitude but it’s what I know, not what I think about this subject.

    • Well, I like numbers! When I first saw the CNG Civic, I crunched some numbers. I live in California, and it seemed that buying CNG was not significantly cheaper than buying gasoline. In some states it was much cheaper. Perhaps recently that has changed as gasoline has gone up. What was a problem was easy refueling. CNG is not easy to find in SF. Home refueling sounded great until I figured out that the price of installing the compressor divided by it’s life span was a very significant cost. Perhaps recently the cost of the pump has declined or it’s lifespan increased. For urbanites in CA it seemed that the Civic was good to drive for pollution concerns, but was not significantly cheaper to drive.

    • Your right about the cost comparison …. and the waste of petroleum used in home energy.

  16. I sure Chrysler has had this in the works but I can’t help but wonder if the final push came from Fiat management. Fiat has built dual fuel (CNG and Gasoline) cars for some time.

  17. Those English cars in WW2 were fueled by coal gas. Which was the only gas available then.
    If I wanted a non fossil fuel powered car/van/lorry I would buy a diesel and run it on cooking oil. Much more practical than LPG and available everywhere fried food is prepared. You just rock up at the counter and ask for a cheeseburger and fries and a couple of gallons of cooking oil please.

  19. The more we vere off into the alternatives to gasoline the more the States and the Feds. get worried. As Wave mentioned, they worry about collecting the “tax” for road use. This will usually bring up the “pay per mile” method of taxing every time a viable alternative gets near fruition. The methods of measurement of these miles hasn’t been decided upon, yet. They have tried a few and also have encountered push back, the method “usually” prefferred by the politicians is the use of GPS tracking to collect the data. The visions of “big brother watching” raise the hackles of the ACLU gang and other like minded conservatives.
    I was in Japan for a couple of years in the 60’s and all of the cabs in Tokyo and other large cities were all LPG/CNG powered. At the Phoenix Airport the buses are all LPG/CNG powered. I wonder if they could shine some light on the overall cost benefits or lack thereof Green CH?
    It will happen…but the free market will be the driver not the government hacks.

  20. Regarding taxation — governments will figure how to tax NG used as a motor fuel to replace the per-gallon tax on gasoline and diesel fuel, which goes to maintaining the roadways. I envision a separate meter attached to home compressors, and owners would pay a tax based on therms just as we do for heating gas. I have no problem with that if it is specifically used for roads and highways, and the road tax would be charged in lieu of the heating tax.

    NG fuel has lots of possibilities and lots of potential problems. Apparently it doesn’t deliver the kind of equivalent mileage gasoline can when used in converted engines. An engine designed from the outset to run on NG would have to be as or more efficient as gasoline, and far cleaner running, to be a viable alternative.

  21. They don’t always let you get by with it. Many of the RV stations that fill propane charge road tax if the vehicle uses it to run. It’s just a matter of time.

    To this point the Gas Company is the only local org that uses LNG. I suspect there will be more to come if our energy secretary gets his way and gas goes to $6.

  22. I’m ok with alternative fuels, but I’d rather see it used for home energy, and leave the gasoline in the cars. Use the natural gas in the electrical generating powerplants and in homes for heating. That would ease the demand a lot, and still allow the gasoline for the cars, where it is still the best choice over anything else.

    Regarding the cost of gasoline, the price of a gallon of gasoline in 1963 was about a quarter. That was when we had silver quarters still in circulation.
    Now, even today, the purchasing value of that same silver quarter is still enough to buy a gallon of gasoline(~$5.00).

  23. Tom Lyons—

    That silver quarter now is worth about 5 bucks, but in 1963 it was worth 25 cents (I was there; I remember). Calculating for inflation, that comes to about $1.85 in today’s dollars. So the “real” price of gasoline has effectively doubled since ’63. The explanation? Supply and demand accounts for part of it, as countries that in 1963 depended on bicycles and sandals for transportation now can’t buy enough cars and motorcycles. The United States now is a net exporter of fuels to help meet the demand. The political argument that gasoline prices would go down if we produce more is a bogus argument; the oil companies would only sell it for the current price. American production exceeds American demand; if the argument held true, then prices would fall, but they keep increasing. Speculation and trading on Wall Street accounts for more of it; political instability in the Middle East ratchets up tension and prices. All the current saber-rattling against Iran is jacking up prices even though the world is awash in crude oil — maybe politically connected energy producers and traders are feeding the insecurity by encouraging irresponsible talk about invading Iran, with the result that prices go even higher.

    As long as we depend on politically sensitive fuels, we will be held hostage to the whims of a greed-driven market. This is why home-grown natural gas is so attractive, although it is subject to the whims of our own political system. And this is why electric vehicles, with batteries charged via solar energy, are the best solution. Sure, we’re still a long way from that reality, but in the end I believe we will see solar panels on every garage roof to charge EVs, cutting the energy companies out of the equation.

    • Jim,
      I’m a certified petrolhead for vehicles, and for me it’s just a terminal case.
      However, I’m very open-minded for alternative energies in other areas, and in fact my house has been totally off the grid or 14 years. I use solar power for my house, and use wood heat, and supplement with some LP gas for convenience when needed.

      I think we could probably reduce the impact of leveraged oil speculators by eliminating margin buying on fuels, and requiring that buyers actually must take physical delivery of the commodity, and store it in approve facilities. That might put a kink in their cubicle.
      It does irk me to see Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan manipulating the price of all these commodities, when they actually are not investing in them, but merely speculating on paper contracts which don’t even have any physical commodity backing behind it. They play around with paper, and drive up everyone’s prices at the pump.

  24. I drive a chevy cavalier that was manufactured with both gas and cng as a fuel option. But I live in a tiny town that obviously doesn’t have a fill station. It still gets good gas mileage on regular fuel so I drive it to work, but likely will one day sell it. If you live in a place like utah there are plenty of CNG stations everywhere you go. I know some places where busses fill up they have opened it up to the public, there is one a couple hours from where I live, filled up there once when I was in town but their prices sucked. But the closest place to my house you can fill up it is only 1.20 a gallon. When we first got the car there was a tax break and it was .67 a gallon.

  25. I’m a big fan of CNG as an alternative automotive fuel, especially when the technology of filling up in your home garage has become a reality. The problem for me is apparant in the photo of the Dodge truck- the tanks are too big for that location and I need all the space in my pickup bed for hauling items. Ever tried to haul a 4×8 sheet of plywood in a Chevy Avalanche? Maybe they could redesign the frame to accomodate the tanks underneath. I hope they keep this idea in the works.

  26. In 1995 the U.S. federal workers in Gettysburg, PA had issues with getting the fuel tanks refueled on their new Chevy factory CNG pick-ups. These trucks had poor fuel mileage and could only be partially charged at a local charge station which took eight hours (overnight). They could get completely topped off in Harrisburg, PA in a few hours time by the natural gas company , but by the time they travelled the 35 miles back to Gettysburg the the tanks were at half pressure.

  27. Maybe NG is good enough for cars and bigger vehicles, and for reducing urban pollution. But it’s not as good on range without heavy tanks, and that sort of cancels the lower consumption.

    In a motorcycle it creates packaging issues complicated enough to make it a one-fueled vehicle. Particularty for bikes, I don’t see any short/medium term alternative energy source better than ethanol. Apart from a little lower mpg, it burns the same, sounds the same, has almost the same energetic density and it just smells a little different. Apart from the fact that it’s really a country-wide proven technology. Maybe I’m a little biased because I’m filling my bike every few days with it, but how many could say the same for electrics, for example?

  28. I see a number of small engines using propane….Lehr outboards and gnerators for RV’s. THis fuel has the big plus of allowing long term dead storage without gummed up carbs/injectors. Wonder of a propane of CNG dirt bike could be built and avoid the issues we have in California with air quality on motocross bikes used on public lands. Most MX riders like to off road as well and most MX bikes are illegal off road.This could work for mowers and the like too.

    This brings up two strokes. Several euro bikes had pressure lube to the botton end bearings….Maybe injection isn’t the only path to a clean air two stroke

  29. I have an LPG converted VW LT31 from 1986. In the UK petrol costs about £1.35 per litre or $2.12 per litre so just over $8.00 per US Gallon. LPG prices vary a lot but they are about £0.70 to £0.80 so about 55% to 60% the price of petrol. The van is slightly down on power running on LPG I can tell on long straight hills, running at the same speeds (so with my foot a bit further down on the throttle I get about 80 to 90% of the MPG I got with petrol. The van has a two stage carb which you can really feel kick into the second stage on petrol and not some much on LPG. The van has a considerably higher resale value I think it was worth the cost on the conversion, but it would be marginal at best if I paid anyone else to do it or already had a reasonably efficient vehicle.

  30. I like the idea but I want to know what they will cost and where you will be able fuel these. Maybe they should put out a educational video on Youtube to show just how this will work. I will be keeping my eye out for more info as the products some to market.
    {rubber tracks}.