Natural gas offers several environmental and economic advantages over petroleum as a fuel for the transportation sector. And while its use is increasing, mainly for commercial and fleet vehicles, natural gas has yet to make significant inroads into the consumer vehicle market.
A major problem with using natural gas as a transportation fuel is its low volumetric energy density — 0.04 MJ/L, vs. 32.4 MJ/L for gasoline. Thus, the volume of fuel needed to produce a given amount of energy — and the size of the tank needed to store it — is much larger for natural gas than for traditional vehicle fuels.
While compressed natural gas (CNG) has a higher volumetric energy density, storing CNG onboard vehicles is not ideal. CNG must be stored in cylindrical tanks because of the high pressures involved. Gasoline tanks, on the other hand, are not cylindrical and, for safety reasons, include notches that fit over the frame or other structure to minimize the chance of the fuel tank shifting in the event of a crash. Because the CNG tank must be cylindrical and cannot include notches, it cannot easily replace a gasoline tank. In addition, compressing natural gas requires expensive compressors that consume energy. And, even...
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