ARTICLE: "Surge in Natural Gas Cars Has Utah Driving Cheaply: Cleaner Than Gasoline, but Shortcomings Remain," by Clifford Krauss, New York Times, 30 August 2008, p. A1.
Neat article that details the rather rapid but underground shifting toward cars that run on natural gas in Utah, reducing their driving cost to something like 87 cents per gallon equivalent.
Utahans are hunting the Internet and traveling the country to pick up used natural gas cars at auctions. They are spending thousands of dollars to transform their trucks and sport utility vehicles to run on compressed gas. Some fueling stations that sell it to the public are so busy they frequently run low on pressure, forcing drivers to return before dawn in the last few months.
Energy independence around the corner? Hardly. But a clear sign that people will react to higher prices and that assumptions about the difficulty of switching over to new, alternative technologies is overblown. Amory Lovins' vision of the future seems a lot less fantastic when you see change pursued like this by ordinary people.
And no Manhattan Project was required!!
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Comments (3)
Since I bought my Honda Civic CNG car, and home refueling pump. The price at home to fill @ $1.07 approx. gal. when super unleaded here in Wa. State was above $4.50 gal. Plus the comfort that when the next oil spike happens, CNG will still be there, and stable price.
Posted by Dave | September 26, 2008 12:27 PM
Many folks will be surprised how many domestic sources for natural gas exist. A natural gas pipeline from Alaska to main continent has been planned for some time while the oil/animal debate gets all the political and media attention.
Posted by Louis Heberlein | September 27, 2008 12:43 PM
A few years ago, in order to comply with EPA clean air requirements for Phoenix, Arizona passed a law giving a tax credit for converting a car to run on natural gas and installing a compressor at your home so that you could refuel your car from the same natural gas line that supplies your furnace and hot water heater. At the time the price of natural gas worked out to ~$0.85 a gallon gasoline equivalent.
The program was so successful that it had to be ended since the tax credits were cutting into state revenues so deeply.
Utah has an interesting record in dealing locally with national problems. During the Depression when the primary economic problem was deflation and the Federal Reserve kept shrinking the money supply, Utah banks issued a local currency, "Valors" which were used within the state although they were not accepted elsewhere.
Posted by Mark in Texas | September 28, 2008 6:44 AM