Compressed Natural Gas Cars: What Are They?

Surprise: the most eco-friendly car sold in America isn't the Toyota Prius. It's the Honda Civic GX, which runs on compressed natural gas, according to the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy. It might come as a shock to hear that Honda only sells about 1,000 of them each year, mostly to government or corporate fleets because there are few places to fuel up. So exactly what is compressed natural gas (CNG)? The short answer is it's a fossil fuel alternative. The long answer?

Although its combustion does produce some greenhouse gases, compressed natural gas is a cleaner-burning alternative to gasoline, diesel, or propane fuel. Plus, it's abundant in America, and cheap. It is also safer than those conventional fuels in the event of a spill, as it is lighter than air and disperses quickly when released. According to the New York Times' Chris Dixon, "About 95 percent of natural gas is methane, a simple molecule consisting of one carbon atom and four hydrogen atoms. When burned, natural gas produces little more than carbon dioxide and water vapor." Dixon points out the economic benefits of compressed natural gas cars as well:

Honda estimates that fuel for a gasoline Civic costs 8.8 cents a mile. I figured the GX's expense at 5.8 cents a mile when fueling at a Clean Energy station, but only about 3 cents a mile if I were filling up at home, not including the lease or installation costs. With those numbers, anyone would breathe easier.

And, as Arv Voss over at the San Fransisco Gate points out:

Consumers who purchase a new Honda Civic GX may be eligible for a $4,000 federal tax credit when they file their tax return for the year in which the vehicle was purchased. In addition, buyers of the natural gas vehicle home refueling appliance "Phill," by Fuelmaker are also eligible for up to a $1,000 tax credit. Tax credits are calculated, based on the Energy Policy Act of 2005. Phill allows consumers to conveniently and safely refuel a natural gas-powered Civic GX from their home at a much lower fuel cost than gasoline. The home refueling unit sells for approximately $4,000 with installation running roughly $1,300.

Compressed natural gas is made by - you guessed it - compressing natural gas to less than 1% of its volume at standard atmospheric pressure. CNG is used in traditional gasoline internal combustion engines that have been converted to bi-fuel usage (gasoline and CNG). Indeed, almost any existing gasoline car can be turned into a bi-fuel car.

According to Bernard Simon of the Financial Times, a new Toyota CNG hybrid will soon be introduced as part of the company's energy diversity strategy. The new Camry hybrid concept will run on both compressed natural gas and electrons stored in a battery as power sources, and will be the only the second compressed natural gas car on the American market.

Wired's Chuck Squatriglia recently suggested that one reason compressed natural gas vehicles aren't as big in America as they are in Europe is because "we get mundane sedans like the Honda GX while they get sexy roadsters like the Cevennes Turbo CNG." He recently featured the Cevennes, which "updates the classic lines of the Porsche 356 and gives it a modern 1.6-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine that cranks out 150 horsepower" as well as CNG Ford Mustang that German Green Autogas and haus Rollin on Chrome recently converted to run on compressed natural gas.

Comments

[dhinds]

01:07 PM on 11/20/2008

I am writing this from Guadalajara to let HuffPo readers know that Mexico has lots of stations where natural gas or propane is sold for use in cars. They are gas stations that sell gas rather than gasoline, and not just in the big cities.

[jason gainesville]

10:27 PM on 11/19/2008

from what i understand as a cng van owner is that we burn the methane.. so then all we have is co2, not methane... however the methane issue is a concern.. methane largely comes from dumps and the asses of cows.. so if you are eating meat please look into the obvious deforestation but also the enormous amount of methane that comes from raising cattle.

[dhinds]

01:08 PM on 11/20/2008

Right - cows belch it - lots of it.

[BatMasterson]

03:28 PM on 11/19/2008

"About 95 percent of natural gas is methane, a simple molecule consisting of one carbon atom and four hydrogen atoms. When burned, natural gas produces little more than carbon dioxide and water vapor."

Hmmm...good thing we're on the internets:

from Wikipedia:Methane in the Earth's atmosphere is an important greenhouse gas with a global warming potential of 25 over a 100-year period. This means that a methane emission will have 25 times the impact on temperature of a carbon dioxide emission of the same mass over the following 100 years. Methane has a large effect for a brief period (a net lifetime of 8.4 years in the atmosphere), whereas carbon dioxide has a small effect for a long period (over 100 years). Because of this difference in effect and time period, the global warming potential of methane over a 20 year time period is 72. The Earth's methane concentration has increased by about 150% since 1750, and it accounts for 20% of the total radiative forcing from all of the long-lived and globally mixed greenhouse gases.[13] Usally, excess methane from landfills and other natural producers of methane are burned so CO2 is released into the atmosphere instead of methane because methane is such a more effective greenhouse gas.

Just in case you missed that last sentence," methane is such a more effective greenhouse gas." Sounds great, this is about as green as the magical "Clean Coal".

[dhinds]

01:09 PM on 11/20/2008

Sounds like it's better to burn it, then

[dhinds]

02:48 PM on 11/20/2008

1.- Methane being released into the atmosphere is not the same as methane being burned as fuel;

2.- Gasoline contains additives that natural gas doesn't require, so natural gas burns much cleaner in your engine and is less contaminating to the atmosphere than gasoline and biofuels creates their own problems;

3.- Concentrating on "greenhouse gases" ignores the fact that the earth's atmosphere is created and maintained by microorganisms and therefore, any contaminant that affects those microorganisms is contributing to the destablization of of the atmospheric portion of our shared environment.