USA, Los Angeles
Natural gas vehicles key part of strategy
At the Low-Carbon Fuels 2008 conference held April 15 in Sacramento, Hal Snyder, vice president of customer programs at SoCalGas and SDG&E, told state regulators and policy makers that the expanded use of natural gas and electricity in transportation will provide significant consumer benefits by accelerating the state’s transition to low-carbon fuels and reducing petroleum dependency. "We can do that by assisting with education and outreach to customers about clean, low-carbon fuels, developing the fueling infrastructure and conducting demonstration and commercialization programs," said Snyder.
Not only are natural gas and electricity among the cleanest
commercially available transportation fuels — providing a 15-percent
to 60-percent reduction in greenhouse-gas emissions — fuel prices are
very competitive relative to gasoline, Snyder said. For example,
natural gas priced today at $9 per million British thermal units (Btu)
is equivalent to about $2.65-per-gallon gasoline.
In January 2007, Governor Schwarzenegger established the world’s first
greenhouse-gas standard for transportation fuels and set a statewide
goal to reduce the carbon content of California’s transportation fuels
by at least 10 percent by 2020. With the state’s 24 million motor
vehicles contributing nearly 40 percent of California’s annual
greenhouse-gas emissions, alternative fuels can provide economic
development opportunities and help reduce emissions of greenhouse
gases, criteria pollutants and toxic air contaminants.
"The Low-Carbon Fuels Standard is critical to the state’s effort to
reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and improve air quality for all who
live and work in this great state," said Mary D. Nichols, chairman of
the California Air Resources Board. "California will continue to lead
the way in developing and promoting sound environmental solutions to
our transportation issues. We all have a responsibility to practice
driving green and living green."
Among their efforts to advance the state’s environmental goals SoCalGas
and SDG&E have committed to reduce the greenhouse-gas emissions of
their fleet vehicles approximately 15 percent by 2012. To achieve that
goal, the utilities will replace company passenger vehicles with hybrid
electric and compressed natural gas vehicles, and implement a fleet
efficiency and optimization program aimed at improving fuel efficiency
and driving habits.
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