It’s a warm summer morning at an unmarked fueling station, where a narrow hose with a faint whiff of kitchen stove is whooshing a high-pressure load of methane gas into a 2001 Honda Civic GX.
This is the car hailed as the cleanest internal-combustion auto on Earth.
Compressed natural gas, or CNG, has been a vehicle fuel since well before World War II. A generation ago it was favored in the U.S. by rugged individualists scorning gasoline’s occasional scarcities and price spikes. By the mid-1990s, CNG was powering hundreds of corporate and government fleets, paying off in fat fuel savings and slashed maintenance costs.
But CNG never caught on with the public. For one thing, the tanks take up more space than gasoline tanks, and they are made of heavy steel. In addition, CNG vehicles have a much shorter range between fill-ups, and in most cities there is a sparse infrastructure of filling stations.
So here’s the yin of Earth-friendly motoring: You must stop more often for fuel and must drive out of your way for it.
The yang: CNG users recently were paying $1.048 per gasoline-gallon-equivalent at Southern California Gas Co.’s local depots; compare that with gasoline prices still well above $1.50 in most of the region and approaching $2 in Chicago. CNG cars produce few emissions; it has been pointed out that such vehicles add more toxins to the atmosphere because of tire wear than engine operation.
The full-size Ford Crown Victoria and the compact Honda Civic GX are the only CNG-dedicated cars available from major automakers.
But the methane-powered product lineup might expand soon. General Motors Corp. is weighing an initiative to offer to the public a bi-fuel Chevrolet Cavalier. “Bi-fuel” means it can run on either gasoline or CNG.
Until now, the Cavalier has been sold only to fleet buyers, but a decision to green-light broader sales might come soon , said Clay Okabayashi, Chevy’s Ventura County-based regional alternative-fuel sales manager.
Toyota Motor Corp. is taking the opposite tack, with U.S. executives citing a lag in fuel availability as the key reason they are abandoning a two-year trial program leasing CNG Camrys to fleet users.
Natural gas industry executives say the infrastructure picture is brighter than painted by Toyota’s move.
Sean Turner, president of the California Natural Gas Vehicle Coalition, said there are 85 CNG-filling stations in Southern California.
That’s compared to estimated 3,500 gasoline filling stations in the region. Southern California Gas has been working to get operators of government and private CNG depots to provide public access.
Honda moved to ease the supply crunch, last year buying a 20 percent share of FuelMaker Corp., a Toronto company that plans within two years to introduce a home-refueling device with a potential market of 3 million customers.
Meanwhile, the Natural Gas Vehicle Coalition in Washington, D.C., is seeking congressional passage of incentives such as a federal income tax credit to cover 80 percent of the cost of new CNG vehicles.
Coalition President Richard Kolodziej said such measures could increase the 111,000 natural gas vehicles on U.S. roads to about 1.6 million by 2010.
In Victorville, where the driver was fueling a borrowed Civic for a trip to Las Vegas, he calculated the Point of No Return as Baker, Calif., where at least a half a tank was needed without risking getting stuck before reaching Vegas and the next available fueling port.
The driver set off at less than the speed limit and with the air conditioner off, measures said to save fuel.
With the fuel-gauge needle hovering over the E, the Civic rolled into Vegas. But the pumps as McCarran were shut down.
Southwest Gas Corp. marketing supervisor Jay Taylor escorted the driver across town to his company’s yard for a fill-up.
“When you run out of fuel in one of these things, you’re [plum] out of luck,” Taylor offered cheerfully. “You have to get towed.”
Even experienced CNG drivers are mystified about how to get a good fill. Industry representatives explain that the temperature of the supply tank is among the variables; so are the age and condition of the equipment. A good fill is a good bet on a cold day. New equipment usually provides a good fill.
