LNG Pros & Cons

[dwreed3rd]

Back before putting our $500 down for a Prius, one of the areas that I looked into was LNG conversions. I saw they were popular in California and at least one company, Canadian if I remember, offered a home filling station, we have gas utility service. Short version is it is not a practicle option here in Georgia yet, at least not for the average residential commuter.

I understand that CA is one of the largest users of natural gas, and unlike GA, and even has public refilling stations, and alot of PC member are Californians. Georgia also has a coastline.

I really would like to keep this non-partisan if at all possible. Notice, I did not say non-political, because I'm sure it is. But I would like to try and keep with actual verifiable facts if at all possible.

Here's what I would like to open for discussion. I would like to get a better understanding of the pros and cons of LNG for as alternative fuel for domestic vehicles. Some of my understandings are, right or wrong?

Pros:
It's clean, green
It's less expensive than gasoline or biofuels

Cons:
The home refilling station took 8-12 hours to refill
If I remember range was limited
As popular as it is in CA, they're having trouble getting permits to build terminals, losing the capital investments and jobs to Mexico. This last one may have some political spin on it, but are the terminals that dangerous?

Atlanta's public buses, MARTA, uses some LNG powered buses and I see alot of various fleet vehicles that use LNG, but still no public stations. I'm not sure but we have major pipelines running from the Gulf up through GA to the Northeastern states. I believe one is LNG. I'm wondering about terminals in Georgia or the Carolina's.

I'm just curious what opinions other PC members may have about LNG.
Could a Prius be converted to use LNG?

Thank you, Dave

[Godiva]

Cons: It's non-renewable and won't last forever. May have peaked already.

Cons: While it is greener than coal or oil, it isn't green. There are still emissions we don't want in the air.

Cons: It might be cheaper now, but it won't stay that way. The price will go up as the supplies go down, just like every other non-renewable.

[chogan2]

If you could find someone to make the conversion, you'd have zero trunk space after the conversion, and the tank would have to ride way up high above most of the framing of the car (because you can't displace the battery). You'd be able to see that big CNG tank through the windows. That doesn't strike me as a good thing. There's no way I would consider a one-off conversion to CNG, as a practical matter.

For reference the CNG civic tank is 6 cubic feet. That'd be a cylinder 3' long and a little over 1.5' in diameter. I think that would have to fit in the back, above the battery, if you wanted to run the car on CNG. Maybe they could pull the gas tank and fit a tank there, but I doubt you'd be that lucky.

For a purpose-built CNG car like the Civic, compare it on Fuel Economy. Ignoring the loss of trunk space, the limited mileage on a tank, and so on, it's just not efficient. It's cheap because natural gas is cheap(er) right now, but it's not as if you get more miles out of the available hydrocarbons. But it does burn clean.

In the broader picture, I agree with others who have said that the best thing to do with natural gas is heat your home with it. There, with a modern furnace, 80% (for a traditional furnace) or 90% (for a high-efficiency condensing furnace) of the energy in the gas gets used. Put it in a car, and you use 15-20% and exhaust the rest.

If its a limited resource, seems to me that running cars on it is not the way to go. I'd rather have to walk than have to freeze, if it comes to that.

On the plus side, supplies are more secure. If oil runs out sooner than natural gas (which would be the bet at the moment), or if a hurricane reduces gasoline production, then you can still drive while others can't.

On net, I don't think a one-off conversion of a Prius would be practical, and in general, I don't think it's a good idea in the grand scheme of things. But it's cheap and relatively plentiful right now.

[daniel]

Cleaner than gasoline, but still contributes to the atmospheric load of CO2. Less convenient, due to the lack of filling stations. A home filling station limits you to a radius of the range of half a tank -- or a bit less to be safe. Mostly it's a domestic resource, whereas gas is largely imported from people who don't like us.

Bottom line: better than gasoline if range and filling are not an issue, but probably not worth converting an existing Prius, IMO.

My personal preference by far would be an EV (which is what I drive most days, when my 40-mile range is adequate).

[tripp]

An EV powered by a NG plant would be far more efficient than CNGV. Of course, the CNGV is considerably cheaper, but NG prices would go nuts if we started pumping large quantities of it into our cars. It lends itself much more to static power generation than transportation fuel.

[dwreed3rd]

I'm only thinking of it as temporary until the alternative energy sources can be developed to a point of being sufficient to support our requirements. I believe it's less expense and the technology is here now to convert existing vehicles to LNG, than scrap and repalce all existing vehicles with PHEV's and batteries. We must not only explore all alternatives, but we need to survive until the viable alternatives can be developed and functioning. Perhaps there are those who have the option to choose an eqtremely more austere lifestyle. But I believe the vast majority of the populations of the world cannot go cold turkey and need to bridge the gap between fossil and/or non-recoverable energy sources and fully recoverable, totally green energy sources.

[tripp]

The trick is that it would dramatically increase electricity rates and fertilizer costs, so it would have a bit of a ripple effect, a lot like oil prices do. Petrol costs would also rise because NG is used to supply H2 for refining operations as well. I think that it makes more sense to aggressively pursue efficiency and alternatives than to try to switch to NG, which will have a pretty short shelf life as a viable alternative to oil.

[dwreed3rd]

Originally Posted by tripp

The trick is that it would dramatically increase electricity rates and fertilizer costs, so it would have a bit of a ripple effect, a lot like oil prices do. Petrol costs would also rise because NG is used to supply H2 for refining operations as well. I think that it makes more sense to aggressively pursue efficiency and alternatives than to try to switch to NG, which will have a pretty short shelf life as a viable alternative to oil.

Good points. Are you saying that we are at maximum capacity for LNG and that using it for cars would redirect it away from other uses?

[tripp]

I don't think we're at maximum capacity. I'm just saying that there is a lot of upward pressure on the price of NG. NG is increasingly being looked at by utilities and it's already getting pretty expensive (the price of NG is quite volatile). Here in CO Xcel Energy is raising their residential rates 28%, citing the rising cost of NG as the reason for the rate hike. I'm not sure where our domestic production stands. There are a number of untapped sources, but my understanding is that the existing fields are now starting to decline. I don't know what the turn around is on NG fields but I'm sure that it takes at least a few years to get into production at the very least.