CHICAGO -- In the race to replace gasoline and diesel as a fuel for passenger vehicles, electric currently has the edge against natural gas—and it’s only expected to grow.
A combination of issues is preventing natural-gas vehicles (NGVs) from gaining greater traction in the passenger segment, according to Bloomberg. Andrew Littlefair, president and CEO of Clean Energy Fuels Corp., Newport Beach, Calif., a natural-gas fueling-station provider, told Bloomberg he was “not sure America is set up” for a broad rollout of natural-gas-powered passenger vehicles, considering the lack of fueling infrastructure.
“There are a lot of reasons it would make sense to look at that again, but I don’t know that I’m ready to say that’s going to happen,” he said.
The United States has 1,828 natural-gas fueling stations, according to government and industry data. These include sites operated by convenience-store chains such as Kwik Trip, Holiday Stationstores, Wawa, Love’s Travel Stops, Family Express and OnCue Express.
Meanwhile, there are more than 8 times as many public charging stations for electric vehicles (EVs), and close to 70 times as many gasoline stations.
Natural gas is still relatively inexpensive, but its use as a transportation fuel is “not something that has taken off” in the passenger market, said Salim Morsy, an analyst for Bloomberg New Energy Finance. And while gasoline and diesel currently have the lowest total cost of ownership, the number of passenger EVs should at least double as battery costs fall and the vehicle technology improves, he said.
Tesla has about 455,000 reservations for its Model 3 mass-market EV, which went into production this summer. This figure is nearly 20 times more than the number of NGVs that were on the road in 2015.
The number of pure EV registrations, meanwhile, has grown from 14,000 in 2012 to 78,000 in 2016, according to data from Edmunds and IHS Markit. The number of passenger NGV registrations fell from 3,000 in 2012 to 337 in 2016.
However, natural gas does have growth opportunities in the fleet business, said Littlefair. For example, municipalities and businesses may favor it for lowering their operating costs and tailpipe emissions. Dallas Area Rapid Transit and the cities of Los Angeles and Fresno, Calif., are just a few that have fleets of NGVs, as do companies such as AT&T and Ryder System.
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