Article on same in today's Wall St Journal. T Boone Pickens and the natural gas industry want a federal subsidy for the purchase of natural gas burning trucks. United Parcel just purchased 48 tractors (the engine and driver part of an 18 wheeler). The standard diesel version costs $95,000, the natural gas burning version costs $195,000. UPS managed to wangle a $4 million dollar subsidy from Uncle Sam to defray expenses. They also said the company won't buy any more natural gas burners without more subsidy.
Some thing is wrong here. A natural gas burning engine is about the same as a diesel engine. It should cost about the same to make. I can see paying a little extra, say 10%, but paying twice as much is a rip off. If we should be so stupid as to put in a subsidy, we will be subsidizing rip off artists.
Natural gas is cheap compared to diesel fuel, like half the price. For an 18 wheeler, which gets 6 miles per gallon, and does a lotta driving, natural gas will save money, assuming you don't get ripped off buying the truck in the first place. Subsidies are not required.
2 comments:
This baffles me...
I can understand if the government wants to give more CNG engine makers a boost, but we have CNG buses in Boston.
Seems like a waste of money. Guess some UPS lobbyist is proving his worth I suppose...
There ain't much difference between a gasoline engine and a natural gas engine, except for the carburetor. A gasoline carburetor uses manifold vacuum to suck the right amount of liquid gasoline out of the float bowl. A natural gas carburetor has to mix the right amount of a pressurized gas into the incoming air. Other than the carb swap, the engines are the same. The fuel tank is different, the natural gas tank is much much bigger, to the point where cramming one into a Corolla would be weird. But a city bus or an 18 wheeler has plenty of room for the bigger fuel tank.
As far as he UPS deal, paying double for natural gas tractors, I think the tractor maker asked an unreasonable price, and the UPS guys went to the Feds and said "We could do all kindza green things but we need some money to make it happen" and the feds fell for it and cut a $4 million dollar check.
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