NGV logo on 2009 Honda Civic GX
Canada has approximately 11,500 natural gas vehicles (“NGV”) on the road while the United States has approximately 150,000 out of the over 7 million natural gas vehicles in the world. Canada and the United States are trailing most other countries when it comes to leveraging natural gas as a viable transportation fuel.
To date, gasoline and diesel have been the primary transportation fuels of choice in Canada and the United States. While gasoline and diesel have been relatively affordable in North America, other countries turned to natural gas as their affordable transportation fuel source. However, international pressure to reduce carbon emissions has lead to reconsidering natural gas as a greener transportation fuel to gasoline and diesel.
Emissions from typical natural gas vehicles are much lower then gasoline or diesel powered vehicles. A study conducted on behalf of the California Energy Commission concluded that natural gas vehicles produce up to 29% less greenhouse gas emissions than comparable gasoline vehicles, and 22% less then comparable diesel vehicles. Natural gas vehicles do emit methane (another greenhouse gas) but it is dramatically offset by the net reduction of CO2.
The most obvious and most immediate opportunities are in heavy transport, public transit and commercial fleet vehicles. These areas of transportation can be more readily integrated into a convenient natural gas distribution network with onsite fill-stations.
A number of Canadian companies are leaders in the field of natural gas transportation and an increase in domestic natural gas production would benefit. Companies like Winnipeg based New Flyer and their line of natural gas powered buses and Westport Innovations and their line of alternative powered engines. Canadian companies that could leverage further domestic growth into international success.
Fiat Siena Tetrafuel
Out of the 7 million natural gas vehicles worldwide nearly 50% of the world fleet is in South America. While Canada only has ~11,500 natural gas vehicles on the road and the United States with approximately 150,000, Brazil has over 1.5 million. Every major car manufacturer in the world has a natural gas vehicle in their product offering with most also offering bi-fuel vehicles that run on both natural gas and gasoline. In 2006, Fiat introduced the Siena Tetrafuel to the Brazilian market, equipped with a 1.4L FIRE engine that runs on E100, E25, Gasoline and CNG. Unfortunately, none of these vehicles are currently being offered in Canada. More can be done to make factory direct natural gas vehicles available to Canadian businesses and consumers alike.
Pathway to Hydrogen
Distribution is key to providing the convenience that consumers have come to expect with gasoline. For transportation natural gas can serve as a very important bridge to hydrogen powered vehicles by providing a distribution network that can subsequently be used for the distribution of hydrogen.
