megatrends

Megatrends
Is natural gas a viable alternative
fuel for HD trucking?
Oliver Dixon looks at the disparate strands that currently populate the natural gas debate, and asks
whether attempts to introduce NG in Europe and North America will be welcomed by the heavy duty
trucking industry
The idea that natural gas might offer an
alternative to both diesel and gasoline is not a
new one, nor is any debate around the issue.
But over the past few months, the conversation
both within Europe and North America
concerning the viability of natural gas has
intensified.
It is, it must be said, a broad discussion,
populated by numerous voices which takes into
account geopolitical, economical, national
interest and environmental considerations and
has joined energy suppliers, equipment
manufacturers, and consumers, with an
unsurprisingly discordant result.
The case for diesel…
There's a good reason why diesel powers the
vast majority of the global heavy duty truck fleet.
It is an extremely dense power source, and an
engine thus powered develops maximum torque
at a far lower engine speed than a gasoline
engine. For HD trucks, designed to move heavy
loads, this is clearly an attractive quality, so the
Q1 2013
adoption of diesel as the fuel of choice for the
global heavy duty fleet is not a surprising one.
And, were everything else to remain equal,
there is little reason to regard diesel as anything
other than the most appropriate fuel for the
bulk of heavy duty applications.
But everything else isn't equal. The price of
diesel has risen markedly in both North
America and Europe over the past decade.
Trucking company operating margins have gone
in the opposite direction, and the trading
environment is as tight as it has ever been. With
fuel representing the single largest input cost of
the majority of trucking operations based either
in Europe or North America, any means of
reducing this cost is likely to be given
considerable attention.
While considerations of cost are clearly the key
operational driver towards a possible wider
spread adoption of natural gas as a fuel for the
HD segment, other issues are now presenting
themselves as significant contributors to the
debate.
…faces a convincing case for NG
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) and
sustainability covers much ground. While it is
clearly foolish to regard transportation - or for
that matter any economic function - as impactneutral
upon the environment, in the battle for
public perception, environmental awareness is
seen entirely reasonably as a plus. There is
nothing new here. However, for the big
shippers, this CSR-sympathetic approach is now
being demanded of suppliers too. If natural gas is
seen as a positive in terms of CSR image, then
so it should benefit from a significant tailwind.
The notion of energy security has long been a key
consideration: the oil shock of 1973 demonstrated
just how crucial an uninterrupted energy supply
was to a modern hydrocarbon-based economy.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) mandates
that each member hold oil stocks equivalent to at
least 90 days of net imports and maintain
emergency measures for responding collectively to
disruptions in oil supply of a magnitude likely to
cause economic harm to its members.
Automotive World Megatrends magazine | www.automotiveworld.com
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