The Cleanest Cars on Earth?: Honda Civic GX and Other Natural Gas Vehicles (NGVs)
Clean Burning Natural Gas Vehicles (NGVs) are hot commodities in some parts of the country, where fuel can sell for as low as $0.63 per gallon.
Unlike the world’s most fuel efficient car (VW’s 285 MPG bullet), the Honda Civic GX looks like a standard passenger vehicle. What makes it special is what you don’t see: tailpipe emissions that are often cleaner than ambient air.
The Civic GX is powered by compressed natural gas—methane—the simplest and cleanest-burning hydrocarbon available. With an economical 113-hp, 1.8-Liter engine, the EPA has called the Civic the “world’s cleanest internal-combustion vehicle” with 90% cleaner emissions than the average gasoline-powered car on the road in 2004.
And get this: in Utah, natural gas can be purchased for $0.63 per gallon.
At $24,590, buying a new Civic GX won’t exactly break your bank account, especially since up to $7,000 will come back to you in the form of state and federal tax credits. But don’t expect to find one easily. The car is only sold in two states, New York and California, and Honda can’t build them fast enough. One dealership said they have over 80 people waiting to buy.
It’s fairly obvious why densely populated states would be interested, especially since natural gas is a readily available source of heating fuel for many parts of the country. Most importantly, the Civic is the Eagle Scout of emissions certifications: it qualified for the California Air Resources Board’s Advanced Technology Partial Zero-Emission Vehicle (AT-PZEV) status, which means that it’s a Super-Ultra-Low-Emission Vehicle (SULEV) with zero-evaporative emissions. To qualify for AT-PZEV, the Civic must also carry a 15-year/150,000-mile warranty on emissions equipment. It also meets EPA’s strict Tier-2, Bin-2 and ILEV certification.
Despite getting the equivalent of a good but not quite amazing 36 MPG highway/24 MPG city, the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) awarded the Civic the green ribbon as the greenest vehicle of 2008. That’s the fifth consecutive year it’s taken the top prize.
So what’s the downside?
Drawbacks to the Civic GX and other Compressed Natural Gas Vehicles
Earlier this week I was clued-in to the explosion in popularity of compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles in Southern Utah, and their potential to overwhelm the 91 refueling stations already in place there.
That’s the biggest drawback to NGVs:
- There are only about 1,600 CNG stations nationwide (compared to 200,000 gas stations), though some areas (like Utah and California) are better served than others. To see where these stations are, see the alternative fuel locater from Mapquest (under #2 on that post).
One way to get around this is to buy your own natural gas refueling station. Since a large number of us burn natural gas for heat, this doesn’t require much more than setting up a pump. The refueling kits, made by FuelMaker, will set you back about $3,500, but that can be offset by substantial tax credits.
- Second drawback: since natural gas is a compressed fuel, the tank takes up some trunk space, and only holds the equivalent of 8 gallons of gasoline. Honda estimates the vehicle’s range to be 220 to 250 miles, although Consumer Reports claimed it was closer to 180 miles.
NGV enthusiasts are getting around range limitations (and vehicle scarcity) by converting their own vehicles to run on natural gas and adding spare tank capacity. Throwing extra tanks in the bed of a truck, for example, can boost driving range to around 600 miles. The best part about converting a vehicle (as opposed to the Civic GX) is that if you run out of CNG, the system automatically switches back to gasoline.
- Third drawback: NGVs don’t provide that great of a reduction in greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions when compared to their gasoline counterparts.
According to the industry group Natural Gas Vehicles for America (NGVA), the reduction is only 20%, which is about the same GHG reduction you get from corn-based ethanol. That doesn’t sound too impressive, but it’s still a reduction, and clean air could be worth it.
The big question mark is natural gas supply. If large amounts of biomethane can be produced from biomass (which is probably already done at your local landfill), the emissions reductions would be much greater.
But What About Natural Gas Supply?
Natural gas supplies 20% of all energy use in the US. According to NGVA: “Even if the number of NGVs were to increase 100-fold in the next ten years to 11,000,000 or roughly 5% of the entire vehicle market (a formidable goal), the impact on natural gas supplies and the natural gas delivery infrastructure would be small — equating to about 4 percent of total U.S. natural gas consumption.”
At first glance, that sounds pretty good, but any increase in natural gas usage means importing more fuel.
Taking a look at data from the Energy Information Administration, the US uses about 21.6 trillion cubic feet of natural gas per year, most of which is produced domestically (18.5 trillion cubic feet) with the difference being imported (4.2 trillion cubic feet). Proved natural gas reserves in the US amount to about 211 trillion cubic feet. If my math is correct, without taking into account any increase in demand, the US only has about 11.5 years of natural gas left. After that, we’re back to square one: importing oil from Russia, Qatar, Iran, and Saudi Arabia
Like petroleum, two-thirds of world natural gas supply exists in just a few countries. If we’re at all worried about having domestic (let alone renewable) energy sources, basing the future of US transportation on natural gas puts us right back in the same position we’re in now.
Also like petroleum, there is an “infinite supply” argument: “Don’t worry, we won’t run out… promise.” NGVA says that if we can tap into methane hydrate ice formations that exist under 1000 feet of water at the bottom of the arctic oceans, we’ll be just fine. Right now, this is about as plausible as time travel, and methane hydrates serve a very important function—they’re a crucial sink for carbon dioxide in the global carbon cycle.
Conclusions
Whether or not we’ve learned our lesson about importing foreign energy, natural gas could still provide a functional infrastructure and technology for transition to hydrogen fuel cells. Natural gas is currently the number one feedstock for producing hydrogen, and refueling stations along California’s hydrogen highway may produce the fuel by reforming natural gas on-site. Basically, this gives us a transition fuel until we figure out how to make hydrogen sustainably.
As for the Honda Civic GX, it may be the cleanest-burning vehicle on the market, but the drawbacks listed above are likely to keep NGVs out of mainstream production for the forseeable future. It seems unlikely that natural gas will stay as cheap as it currently is in Utah, but relatively low pricing could keep the car’s popularity high in some areas. It will be interesting to see how things resolve there.
For more on the Honda Civic GX, see Honda’s Website and Consumer Reports. See more pictures below.
For more on Natural Gas, see Natural Gas Cars: CNG Fuel Almost Free in Some Parts of the Country.
Posts Related to Alternative Fuels and Green Car Technology:
- Affordable Electric Cars Coming to US in 2009
- How Biodiesel Fuel-Cells Could Power The Future (And Your Car)
- How Solar Panels Could Power 90% of US Transportation
- Six New Technologies Will Help Manufacturers Reach the 35 MPG Goal (Without Hybrids)
- An Air Car You Could See in 2009: ZPM’s 106 MPG Compressed-Air Hybrid
- Clean Diesel Cars Coming to US This Fall: 2008-2010 Timeline
Photo Credit: Honda
If we really want our planet to have clean air, lets be real. Electric cars are the answer for the general public. I still have are hard time dealing with the fact that took away the EVA cars. I think thats what they were called.The documentary I saw about it SHOCKED me. All those cars being crushed because the oil and auto industries couldn’t deal with the lost of revenue. I wish the policy makers would answer to the people of this country as well as the industry that did this. thank you….
With natural gas reserve, you forgot a trillion cubic feet. http://www.naturalgas.org/overview/resources.asp
And this number might not even reflect the natural gas trapped in all the shale formations.
I would recommend that everyone desiring to create a business of converting a vehicle to another form of fuel supply consider, The Electric Vehicle Free Conversion Foundation (EVFCF). There are issues which should be the commanding solution for Banks, Loan Associations, and consumer’s, mainly resulting from how vehicles have been handled in payment processing. The Electric Vehicle Free Conversion Foundation (EVFCF) at http://jonalist.bravehost.com/Jonalist.html is a unique project which would endorse every such operation in all states and be a free conversion. You really must read more about this project to fully understand how a warranty protects the consumer as well as the public from abuse of conversion as there are possible problems which result in people taking a unfair advantage of others from a converted vehicle such that they would establish a business of renting their vehicle to others at a profit. The Electric Vehicle Free Conversion Foundation (EVFCF) would find them out and such warranty would be ended, their Grant which allowed the conversion would be invalid and state law enforcement could apprehend them and the vehicle confiscated immediately because without supporting the Grant Process a consumer is violating others rights whom are and the illegality issue they began by renting the vehicle in a business would be against the rules set forth in the Grant, loss of the Grant and the warranty makes the vehicle a threat to others whom are driving their vehicle with or without conversion so a lawsuit is not actually something The Electric Vehicle Free Conversion Foundation (EVFCF) is willing to undertake to resolve issues created by those whom take advantage of others. Really it is a open shut case against those individuals and a warning is not a fair way to show others they are being protected, the state then has the advantage to cease the individuals drivers license and all insurance companies can refuse to sell that individual a insurance policy coverage from that day further which is saying a mouthful to those whom take advantage of others to not do that to their driving record. By all logical means this is the ultimate punishment a individual should experience, it is about as bad as driving off from a gas station without paying or stealing gasoline, where in some states a first offense is a fine of $500 and a second offense is also a fine of $500 plus forfeiture of their drivers license and their vehicle is towed in and ceased which results in a impoundments fee, and insurance coverage to get it back.
Ethanol creation via corn a eatable crop is more likely to end once Genetics starts entering the fuel processing methods to consider, some of these genetic options are already heading to Brazil to begin processing and growth. Economical Flower Greenhouses are far more appealing than Pig Dung Processing Plants to produce Bio-Diesel and Flowers producing Ethanol would be sweeter. General Electric made a good consideration to create a Hydrogen Generator for running off the Power Grid. I figure that Genetically Altered Flowers being made capable to grow cellulose containing sugar would be the objective to have a high yield of Ethanol from bio-digester processes. We would need a super large building to accomplish this and we would have to end any Flower Sales based on keeping strict control of the Flower because of its Genetic Altercation. Ethanol would then become a produced fuel from Flowers and we could bring a limitation of its production through corn plus bring into the mix other sources for the bio-digestion to convert and this would conserve on having separate facilities for converting the plant materials to Ethanol. Therefore one or more conversion facilities could be created in each state.
Alabama Gas has yet to announce their support for CGN and it could be that their controller Energen Corporation has more say in what Alabama Gas can do than Alabama Gas so the limited support given to this is because of this situation. It is a concern that consumer’s with a CNG Vehicle can own a Refill Station for their home, it is another concern that a thief can access their home and steal it or the Natural Gas and continue on their journey, but hereto the issue is that of making these units as a rental for a homeowner through their Gas Company so its use will be added to their billing statement each month. This can cause a issue to homeowners whom work for a employer that has a policy to give them fuel cost they incur during their employ. A home Refill station does no show whom is using the unit and how much is being used so the actual amount is skeptical in so much that a mans wife could also own a CNG Vehicle and use it as well as he whom is covered by his company policy. The final situation is that many homes do not have a connection that is without the need of installing requiring the Natural Gas Company to come out to the home to cut-off the Natural Gas Supply so a installer could install a connection for a Home Refill Station for a consumer. If a consumer needs this they should also consider whether or not they should have another connection for their barbecue grill and do that connection as well.
Consumer’s have something else to be thankful for besides CNG Vehicles, a company now in China makes a CNG Bicycle and another company makes CNG lawnmowers, other companies make CNG motorcycles. It will not be long in waiting that companies will consider making CNG powered motor boats and two person water transport vehicles. This growing marketing field is bringing more job responsibilities to all Natural Gas Suppliers and people seeking jobs should always check that option for their livelihood. Their is another company whom is making the process of adding CNG and Hydrogen to their vehicle by changing a module which has the fuel in it instead and it also has a separate home refill option - . This is entirely new Product Architecture, Gas to Solid-State, is now offered by Limnia, Inc. more info here: http://www.limnia.com/
The most widely talked about method of storing hydrogen is in pressurized tanks, where the gas is typically under pressure from 10,000 to 30,000 psi. Hydrogen pressurized in cylinders has limited storage capacity because of its low density. For electric vehicles, most tank-based systems average 100 to150 miles on one tank. Tank-based storage systems have other disadvantages too. “They’re problematic up and down. The tanks are so big, they take up a lot of space, and the re-fueling process can be dangerous because of the high pressure coming out of the pump,” said Redmond. What’s more, the limited storage capacity of the vehicles makes frequent re-fueling necessary, which means a lot of stations need to be built to keep this type of car running over a long distance. Limnia claims, “With our solid-state cassettes, you can drive 2,500 miles across America without ever turning off your engine. You can just hot-swap cassette modules,” said Redmond. Three cassettes in an electric car can take you 300 miles. “Fifteen companies have designed electric cars that can take you 600 miles on the same three cassettes,” said Redmond. The company’s cassettes, which also power homes, buildings, communities, data centers, and more, integrate board, box, safety, mounting, signal path, power path, shielding, I/O, sequencing, and support rail into a complete chassis system. Unlike conventional systems, Limnia uses a small pack of batteries as a supplement - the Battery Multiplex Array (BMA) massive Commodity-class battery pack. “The batteries are not direct to the motor. They are in between. The fuel cell is constantly recharging them, so we can get away with fewer batteries,” said Scott Redmond, Vice President of Product Architecture, Limnia, Inc.. Limnia’s system uses existing infrastructure to replace the cassettes, with drop-off and pick-up locations at UPS, FedEx, and Kinko’s. You can also have new fuel cassettes shipped to you through one of these carriers or US Mail, or simply re-fuel the cassettes in your home. A home pack, which comes with the system, re-charges the cassettes using two methods. The first is hydrolysis, which cracks the hydrogen. “If you electrocute water in a certain way with a certain type of salt, hydrogen bubbles out of the water. Limnia’s home pack uses the GE Noryl electrolyzer, which makes hydrogen cheaper than any other method out there - even gasoline,” said Redmond. The other way to produce hydrogen is via a microbial reactor. This consists of specially engineered bugs that eat waste to release hydrogen gas. Both sources of hydrogen are readily available. The home pack uses kitchen waste, as well as water to produce the hydrogen. Storage racks in the base of the unit hold charged cassettes for future use.
What’s more, hydrogen powered appliances are now available in both the consumer and industrial markets, driven by improvements in the automotive industry. In cold weather environments, fuel cells can replace heating systems. According to Redmond, “There is a type of fuel cell for homes that runs hotter than it needs to run. Heat is piped off the fuel cell with water tubes that extend underneath the floor. With this type of system, there is no reason you need to be hooked up to a grid.” Initial cost of investment is high; however, Redmond said that over time, it pays for itself.
“We’ve had a lot of data centers call us for battery-backup because the hydrogen fuel cells have a longer run time, no EMF, and no vibration,” said Redmond. Big buildings are also installing fuel cell systems. “In Silicone Valley a lot of the big Internet companies are having to move out because they cannot pull enough electricity to the building, but they can pull water and natural gas to the building, which you can crack to run the fuel cell,” he added.
Many fuel cell systems are available for large factories and large industrial systems. They suit certain industries because they produce no vibration, no toxic fumes, and no outgassing. They also have a cleaner electrical signal, less failures, and almost no maintenance.
Iam all for it.Why is that these cars are not being made by GMC, Ford and Chrysler?
I like this car make more lol or the post make more of the posts. anyway keep telling people the more they know the more they want it
Back in the 70s we told people it’s going to run out. Natural gas as a transition is ok. Solar would be even better so that we can get around with zero emissions, don’t need a gas station, sun shines most every day, everywhere, with a battery backup. Why is this not happening? Big business would take a blow. Come on people, jump on the bandwagon and tell your candidate you want it now. The technology is there and if you want it, it will come but we have to scream for it.
What is the costs and procedure to transform my current vehicles to natural gas
I want to know when more automakers will make NGV’s for the US commuters. With Adsorbed Natural Gas tanks (filled with activated charcoal or corn cobs) the pressure can be reduced significantly and the tanks can be custom shaped to fit different cars better, all the while increasing the cars range as well. And yes it’s spelled correctly - Adsorbed,
http://www.energtek.com/market/natural_gas_vehicles
Clayton. How about giving us a comparison between propane (LPG) and natural gas (CNG) as an alternative fuel. LPG requires a much lower storage pressure so the tank isn’t so bulky…etc. In the late 70’s LPG conversions were popular where cars and trucks could run on either gasolene or propane by the flip of a switch. An observation is that LPG fueling stations are easy to find whereas CNG is rare. How about a well researched article giving us the pro’s and con’s of LPG vs CNG? Thank you.
My sister lives in Georgia and says the price of natural gas has tripled in the past 5 years. Are we just trading one foreign type of price gouging for a domestic one? Its hard to see natural gas as any more than a transitional fuel for the next ten years or so, until the fuel cell technology catches up. T Boone Pickens has a plan based on natural gas in cars replacing gasoline and saving 30% of our fossil-fuel requirements. HUGE wind power farms would allow the natural gas we now use for industry to be shifted to our vehicles. While I agree it would be domestic power, and that is a good thing generally, I strongly object to be gouged by domestic natural gas producers too.