[misterno]

Okay so I just read the below article;

http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20120307-709450.html?mod=WSJ_Energy_middleHeadlines

It says Nat gas price is now down to $2.285 MMBTU. Meanwhile Brent oil is trading at or around $123/barrel.

The ratio is 123/2.285 = 53.89

As far as I know this is the highest ever recorded ratio.

Why is this important? It is important because although natural gas is in its cheapest state relative to oil and yet you do not hear any auto manufacturer rushing to build natural gas pickups or you do not hear any natural gas marketers/sellers/drillers/utilities rushing to build natural gas stations.

In other words, crude oil is still the king. Let the ratio be 300 and you STILL will not see natural gas stations anywhere because of gasoline and diesel's convenience, ease of tradibility and storage capability. Crude oil is still TOO cheap to look for another alternative. That means crude oil price has still plenty of room to rise.

[Wootan]

Why is this important? It is important because although natural gas is in its cheapest state relative to oil and yet you do not hear any auto manufacturer rushing to build natural gas pickups or you do not hear any natural gas marketers/sellers/drillers/utilities rushing to build natural gas stations.

In other words, crude oil is still the king. Let the ratio be 300 and you STILL will not see natural gas stations anywhere because of gasoline and diesel's convenience, ease of tradibility and storage capability. Crude oil is still TOO cheap to look for another alternative. That means crude oil price has still plenty of room to rise.

Not sure if you can draw those conclusions looking at the ratio.

Obama really surprised me when GM was Government Motors. Why didn't he start an ambitious program transitioning from imported crude to domestic NG? It would have partly solved many political issues: the US dependence on ME oil, the hyped "change" he won the election on, greener jobs. He would have killed many flies with one swat.

It is quite easy to retrofit in most cars. No problems in new cars, the infra-structure is very much like the existing infra-structure. GM's Volt have had problems with fires, perhaps the auto industry is afraid of new/dangerous technology?

[misterno]

It might be easy to retrofit in most cars and even easy to construct thousands of new NG stations. But how do you think Nat gas should be stored in the vehicle and how safe is it?

Also, if it is east to retrofit cars to NG, how come none of the utilities/people/companies taking advantage of this 53 times cheaper energy source. And this is happening in a recessionlike economy?

Something does not make sense.

Either the technology is there but not viable or feasible or we are missing something.

Don't forget NG is 53 times cheaper than oil now. And yet, no NG vehicles on the road. Not even commercial.

[jedrider]

TAR SANDS

Don't they use a lot of NG to liberate the Oil from the Tar Sands? So, only as long as NG is relatively cheap, will that be a source of 'economical' Oil (discounting any environmental costs, of course).

[Wootan]

It might be easy to retrofit in most cars and even easy to construct thousands of new NG stations.

Thousand of cars use propane in Europe, tanking mostly from dedicated stations. But existing gas stations could be upgraded with a tank.

But how do you think Nat gas should be stored in the vehicle and how safe is it?

It is stored in a tank, of course, in the back. Safety? How safe is petrol?

Also, if it is east to retrofit cars to NG, how come none of the utilities/people/companies taking advantage of this 53 times cheaper energy source. And this is happening in a recessionlike economy?

Something does not make sense.

Either the technology is there but not viable or feasible or we are missing something.

I'd guess it is politics. Are you sure on the 53 times more expensive oil?

Of course compression, storing, and transport of NG costs more than with diesel/petrol. I don't know it is necessary to distill out the propane fraction, that would cost as well.

In Europe, government have stimulated conversion, by not taxing propane, while petrol is heavily taxed.

[ColossalContrarian]

I bet UPS is happy their fleet is all using natural gas!

[misterno]

It might be easy to retrofit in most cars and even easy to construct thousands of new NG stations.

Thousand of cars use propane in Europe, tanking mostly from dedicated stations. But existing gas stations could be upgraded with a tank.

But how do you think Nat gas should be stored in the vehicle and how safe is it?

It is stored in a tank, of course, in the back. Safety? How safe is petrol? [quote]

First petrol is not as combustible and flammable as NG

Second, In Europe they mostly use LPG not propane and LPG is a byproduct of crude oil. I know in Italy they have some Nat gas cars but most of Europe don't have it. In Turkey almost half of the cars are fueled by LPG not Nat Gas.

[misterno]

It might be easy to retrofit in most cars and even easy to construct thousands of new NG stations.

Thousand of cars use propane in Europe, tanking mostly from dedicated stations. But existing gas stations could be upgraded with a tank.

But how do you think Nat gas should be stored in the vehicle and how safe is it?

It is stored in a tank, of course, in the back. Safety? How safe is petrol?

Also, if it is east to retrofit cars to NG, how come none of the utilities/people/companies taking advantage of this 53 times cheaper energy source. And this is happening in a recessionlike economy?

Something does not make sense.

Either the technology is there but not viable or feasible or we are missing something.

I'd guess it is politics. Are you sure on the 53 times more expensive oil?

Of course compression, storing, and transport of NG costs more than with diesel/petrol. I don't know it is necessary to distill out the propane fraction, that would cost as well.

In Europe, government have stimulated conversion, by not taxing propane, while petrol is heavily taxed.

Are you sure about propane? I think it is LPG that is not taxed in Europe due to heavy usage in households for cooking.

[Plantagenet]

It is important because although natural gas is in its cheapest state relative to oil and yet you do not hear any auto manufacturer rushing to build natural gas pickups...

I posted a link in the natural gas vehicles thread a few days ago reporting that both Chrysler and GM announced that they are rushing to build natural gas pickups to come out next year.

Chysler and GM both plan to bring out CNG pickups in 2013

AND Honda just announced that their Civic GX CNG car sales program is being expanded to all 50 states, so they're going nationwide next year as well.

[Wootan]

Sorry, I believe I was jumping to conclusions. In Scandinavia, LPG is (mostly?) propane, but most appliances using propane, also handles a mix of propane and butane just as well. Butane has more energy (I'd guess 5 - 10 %) than propane, but suffers in extreme cold.

Taxation will vary, and I'm no expert. It is taxed in Sweden, but not in Norway. Price of LPG is 44 % of unleaded regular, in Sweden it is 87 %.

Cars running on NG would profit from a NG-specific-engine. From Wiki:

CNG is a cleaner alternative to other automobile fuels such as gasoline (petrol) and diesel. As of 2008 there were 9.6 million natural gas vehicles worldwide, led by Pakistan (2.0 million), Argentina (1.7 million), Brazil (1.6 million), Iran (1.0 million), and India (650,000).[24][25] The energy efficiency is generally equal to that of gasoline engines, but lower compared with modern diesel engines. Gasoline/petrol vehicles converted to run on natural gas suffer because of the low compression ratio of their engines, resulting in a cropping of delivered power while running on natural gas (10%–15%). CNG-specific engines, however, use a higher compression ratio due to this fuel's higher octane number of 120–130.[26]

They have NG cars in Pakistan, so I'm sure you Americans would be able to those engines as well.

[misterno]

well LPG is a subproduct of crude oil so it does not count.

Now propane is a byproduct of NG but I don't see anywhere it is used.

Butane is just another name for LPG and again a crude oil by product. But I don't know why it underperforms in cold weather. There must be a technical explanation behind it.

Note that Pakistan, Argentine and Brazil uses NG in their cars but I don't see that growing to take over gasoline powered cars.

[LoneSnark2]

But they are rushing to build converting plants to reform natural gas into gasoline.

[SeaGypsy]

NG & Propane are not the same. Propane conversion is relatively simple, whereas most modern engines are too short a stroke for efficient NG conversion. Also Propane makes up a relatively small percentage of either main sources, NG or crude, usually well under 10% by volume.
(Propane use is very common in Australia, NZ and parts of EU.)

[ragged]

This is my 2002 Ford F-150 that was built by Ford to run only on CNG (dedicated). I get gas (nat.) for $1.87/Gallon (Gallon Gasoline Equivalent (GGE)). You can buy a home compressor and fill up at home for $1/gallon or so. The compressors are pretty pricey still though:



If people have questions about CNG vehicles, I'd recommend checking out cngchat.com. There is a lot going on now.

Plug-and-Play Natural Gas - Chesapeake, GE goose infrastructure with "CNG In a Box": http://www.cspnet.com/news/fuels/articles/plug-and-play-natural-gas

Last week, Chesapeake Energy Corp. and GE announced a collaboration to develop infrastructure solutions to help accelerate the adoption of natural gas as a transportation fuel. The first tangible evidence of this collaboration: the introduction of more than 250 “CNG In a Box” modular and standardized CNG compression stations.

Included in the “box” is a gas compressor with storage, cooling, drying and controls, as well as GE Wayne dispensers with credit-card capability and provision for a POS interface. The plug-and-play unit comes in an 8-by-20 or 8-by-40-foot container, depending on a site’s volumes.

The plug-and-play CNG fueling offer is a product of GE’s ecomagination-qualification process, which aims to accelerate the development of clean-energy technology that meets high environmental and innovation standards. The companies will officially debut the CNG In a Box product, along with pricing details, at the NACS Show in Las Vegas this October.