Vehicles in Urban Area to Be Fueled by Natural Gas instead of Petrol
- Details
- Category: Governmental News
- Published: Tuesday, 21 February 2012 10:02
The air quality in the urban area of Ningbo will be greatly improved in the near future as some of the buses, taxies, port container trucks are expected to use natural gas rather than petrol as fuel as required by the city government in the Gas-for-Petrol Scheme of Buses, Taxis, Container Trucks in the Urban Area which was released a couple of days ago.
According to the Scheme, by the end of the 12th Five-Year Plan there will be 2500 natural gas buses in the urban area, to account for half of the total, with around 10 supporting service stations. There will be 3500 dual-fueled taxis (petrol and natural gas), accounting for 70% of the total, with 15 to 20 service stations providing two fuels. There will be 500 container trucks using natural gas, accounting for 40% of the total in Ningbo Port, with 3 to 4 service stations providing LNG.
Currently, there are over one million motor vehicles in the city. Emissions by vehicles are responsible for 30% of the air pollutants in Ningbo among which the most frequently used buses and taxis account for nearly a half. All of these constitute a major threat to the quality of the air. It is indicated that emissions of various toxic gases can be reduced by 85%, noise by 40% if natural gas is used. Also, the cost of this fuel is lower than petrol. Natural-gas-fueled buses and taxis are widely seen in cities of Chengdu, Chongqing and Xi'an.
The scheme will be carried out in six districts in Ningbo step by step. The rest places can make some adjustments with a reference to their own situations.
According to the scheme, targeted vehicles for natural gas are buses, taxis and port container trucks in the urban area. LNG( liquefied natural gas) is more suitable for container trucks and passenger buses with heavy weight, big displacement and long-distance drive. CNG (compressed natural gas) is more suitable for cars, taxis and buses. Taking these elements into consideration, buses are expected to rely on both LNG and CNG, taxis on CNG and port container trucks on LNG only.
In response to those changes in vehicle fuels, the construction of LNG, CNG or L-CNG stations will be added to laying-out of bus stations. CNG stations or LNG-and-Petrol stations will be added to urban planning and LNG station added to ports. Presently, the construction of city natural gas station has already been started.
