All posts in Fleets

Source: FuelFix.com

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — A plain, white building in a business park off Bakers Ridge Road houses a key component in America’s transportation future.

This is the home of WVU’s National Alternative Fuels Training Consortium (NAFTC) — the nation’s epicenter for training and promotional programs for alternative fuel and advanced technology vehicles — electric, natural gas and hydrogen.

The building itself is unremarkable — outside it’s a white box. Inside are an administrative area, a few classrooms — one small and one large — a lab and a five-bay shop.

What goes on inside is what sets it apart.

NAFTC’s goal is to promote and foster energy independence through four areas of emphasis: Curriculum development, training courses and workshops, education outreach; and program management.

It was founded in 1992 as WVU worked with the natural gas industry to develop its program, but has since expanded to include other alternative-fuel transportation.

The NAFTC offers more than 25 courses and workshops, Assistant Director Judy Moore said. More than 30,000 technicians have taken 1,600 courses — people from the U.S. Air Force, the Department of Energy, NASA, Disney, city metro departments, public utilities and more.

More than 650,000 people have attended more than 1,500 workshops and awareness events.

What’s under the hood — and inside the trunk — of an electric car is far different from what’s inside a gasoline-powered one. Emergency responders take courses to learn how to rescue people from electric cars without harming themselves or the people they’re rescuing.

The training isn’t all done at NAFTC headquarters, Moore said. The consortium has 50 sites across the country: National training centers at community colleges and universities, and associate training centers at secondary schools and tech-ed schools that focus on auto tech students.

NAFTC also has a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy to develop materials for its Clean Cities Coalition program.
Read more

Source: Environmental Expert

SANTA MONICA, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– As the hybrid and electric vehicle markets continue to grow in the U.S., so too grows the number of batteries in these vehicles that eventually will need to be recycled. And while the heaviest volumes of discarded batteries are still years away from hitting recycling plants, the first set of aged and failed batteries from hybrids built over a decade ago are giving the automotive and recycling industries an opportunity to prepare for the coming storm, reports Edmunds.com, the premier online resource for automotive information.

“There are signs that the batteries in the very earliest Toyota Prius andHonda Insight hybrids are starting to go, but those cars were sold in relatively small numbers,” says Edmunds.com Green Car Analyst John O’Dell. “Just 19,000 Insights and 33,000 Prius models were sold in the U.S. through the 2003 model year. That’s not yet enough to feed a commercial recycling industry.”

Edmunds.com estimates that more than two million conventional and plug-in hybrids and electric cars are on the road in the U.S. today, a number that will continue to grow. Automakers sold more than 193,000 hybrids and EVs in the first five months of 2012, easily setting a record for the biggest January-to-May sales volume, despite the heavy price premiums for some of these vehicles.

“Over the long term, recycling will play an important role in reducing the costs of hybrids and EVs,” says O’Dell. “The reuse of the metals and rare-earth compounds that make these batteries work will help keep costs down, and the market for used batteries also will help prop up the resale value of electric-drive vehicles, which is a definite plus for consumers.”

While experts don’t expect a viable commercial recycling market for hybrid and EV batteries for at least another decade, large recycling firms like Umicore and Toxco are testing and developing efficient processes to recycle the batteries before they hit their plants in heavy volumes. They’re also beginning to expand their operations in the U.S. to accommodate the inevitable jumps in volume – Umicore is building a new facility in North Carolina to break down battery packs before shipping the components to its headquarters plant in Belgium for recycling, while Toxco is increasing capacity to develop lithium-ion battery recycling processes at its plant in Lancaster, Ohio, under a $9.5 million federal grant.

Edmunds.com reports that once battery recycling hits full throttle, it should be a painless process for consumers. Auto dismantlers and designated recyclers will handle all the recycling; the car owner won’t have to do anything except get the vehicle and its faltering battery to a dealer.

For more information on how the automotive industry is preparing its mass recycling process for hybrid and electric vehicles, please read “What Happens to EV and Hybrid Batteries?” at http://www.edmunds.com/fuel-economy/what-happens-to-ev-.

How do car buyers know if a hybrid or EV is right for them? Green Car Analyst John O’Dell lays out all the considerations at http://www.edmunds.com/car-buying/is-a-.

Source: Environmental Expert.com

Under the Mack brand, the range of trucks powered by natural gas will be expanded by a further two models during 2013, Mack Pinnacle and Mack Granite.

The expansion entails that the Volvo Group (STO:VOLVA)(STO:VOLVB) will be also able to offer North American customers trucks powered by natural gas in the distribution and construction segment under the Mack brand. The Mack TerraPro model is already available to customers in the waste mangement segment. All models will be offered with engines powered by either liquid natural gas (LNG) or compressed natural gas (CNG).

Earlier this year, the Volvo Group announced that it planned to launch a proprietarily developed 13-liter engine for liquid natural gas (LNG) under the Volvo brand in the North American market in 2014. With the new solutions, the Volvo Group will capitalize on the expertise built up over many years with respect to developing alternative powertrains.

At the same time, further steps are being taken in the cooperation with the City of New York, where field tests have been conducted for a number of years using hybrid trucks for waste collection. The field tests will now be expanded to include the Mack TerraPro vehicle. The truck currently uses the Volvo Group’s proprietarily developed hybrid technology, which achieved major success primarily with respect to its buses, with customers in Gothenburg and London. The Volvo Group’s parallel hybrid reduced fuel consumption by up to 37%, compared with conventional diesel-powered buses.

June 14, 2012

For more stories from the Volvo Group, please visit http://www.volvogroup.com/globalnews.

The Volvo Group is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of trucks, buses and construction equipment, drive systems for marine and industrial applications and aerospace components. The Group also provides complete solutions for financing and service. The Volvo Group, which employs about 115,000 people, has production facilities in 20 countries and sells their products in more than 190 markets. In 2011 annual sales of the Volvo Group amounted to about SEK 310 billion. The Volvo Group is a publicly-held company headquartered in Göteborg, Sweden. Volvo shares are listed on OMX Nordic Exchange Stockholm. For more information, please visit www.volvogroup.com

Source:Fuel Fix

Domestic oil production is on the rise but so is the political debate about who should take the credit.

According to an Energy Information Administration report, U.S. oil production rose through the first three months of 2012 to the highest level since 1998. Experts, however, say the Obama administration and Congress shouldn’t be patting themselves on the back.

“In the end, the president and Congress can’t take credit for what price and technology have delivered,” Tom Kloza, the chief oil analyst at Oil Price Information Service, told Politico. “It would be akin to taking credit for the iPad.”

Crude oil prices stayed over the $100-mark for most of the first five months of the year before falling to $80-range in the past month. Those high prices, Kloza told Politico, gave companies an incentive to explore the Bakken and Eagle Ford shale plays.

Technology is also driving the increase in production. Horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing are opening more areas up for exploration and development, creating a land rush in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio and other parts of the nation.

Kloza told Politico the trend likely will continue unless crude oil prices collapse or there is a scientific indictment on fracking.

Republicans and Democrats have sparred over the past year about energy production. Republicans are pushing for increased drilling and less regulatory red tape, claiming the Obama administration is hindering U.S. production.

Industry and Republican officials have insisted that the rise in oil production is due to increase driving on private and state lands, two areas the president has little control over.

Democrats, on the other hand, have said the numbers speak for themselves. U.S. oil production has risen every year since President Barack Obama took office.

“That is certainly thanks in part to steps taken by this administration,” White House spokesman Clark Stevens told Politico.

Source: Chron.com

The nation’s slow roll toward cheap natural gas fuel for commercial fleets took another step Thursday as Shell Oil Co. said it’s gearing up to supply liquefied natural gas to 100 interstate highway fueling stations across the nation beginning in 2013.

Under the tentative terms of the agreement, Shell will construct more than 200 LNG lanes for fueling heavy-duty trucks at TravelCenters of America stations and Petro Stopping Centers across the country.

Locations for the LNG pumps will be selected based on the needs of cross-country commercial trucking customers, according to a statement from TravelCenters, a full-service truck stop chain with 165 locations nationwide. It owns Petro Stopping Centers.

Natural gas proponents have pushed for greater use of the fuel for transportation. Supporters say the fuel is a way to relieve the glut of domestically produced natural gas on the market. The oversupply has driven down the cost of natural gas fuels, compared to crude-based gasoline and diesel.

The scarcity of natural gas pumps and cars have made the fuel impractical for most private motorists. But natural gas fuels are getting more attention from trucking companies and other businesses that run large fleets.

Houston-based Waste Management said last month it is pushing to convert all of its 18,342 trucks nationwide from diesel to compressed natural gas – including 80 trucks that now refuel at company pumps in Conroe.

The liquefied natural gas Shell is providing allows for greater range than compressed natural gas, making it more practical for long-haul trucks if drivers can count on a regular supply along their routes.

“Using natural gas for transport gives truck fleet operators a new, strong advantage because it’s abundant and affordable and a viable alternative to diesel,” Elen Phillips, vice president of Shell Fuels Sales & Marketing North America, said in a written statement.

TravelCenters said it plans to train repair technicians and equip its truck service bays and emergency roadside repair vehicles to respond to the nation’s growing fleet of natural gas-powered trucks.

The agreement with TravelCenters is Shell’s latest move to expand LNG fuel sales across the continent for trucking, marine and rail industries. The company plans to begin supplying LNG to Flying J truck stops in Canada this year.

Shell and TravelCenters have entered an exclusive negotiating period to complete the agreement.

simone.sebstian@chron.com twitter.com/SimonesNews

June 20: Live Webcast on Accelerating Innovation in Fuel Cells

The Energy Department, in partnership with the Battelle Commercialization Council of Labs, will present a live webcast titled Accelerating Innovation: Fuel Cells on Wednesday, June 20, 2012, from 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. EDT. This webcast will highlight four fuel cell-focused technologies developed at DOE national laboratories, all of which are found on EERE’s Energy Innovation Portal. During this webcast, attendees will learn about cutting-edge hydrogen and fuel cell technologies, with a focus on core-shell nanocatalysts for hydrogen production and fuel cell electrodes, as well as activated aluminum hydride hydrogen storage. Presenter Kimberley Elcess of Brookhaven National Laboratory will participate in a question-and-answer session at the end of the presentation.

Register now to attend the webcast.

VANCOUVER, May 18, 2012 /PR Newswire/ — Westport Innovations Inc. (TSX:WPT) (NASDAQ:WPRT), the global leader in natural gas engines, today announced that Volvo Trucks today unveiled its plans to launch a 13 liter heavy-duty natural gas engine featuring Westport™ high pressure direct injection (HPDI) technology. The product is scheduled to launch for the North American market in 2014.

‘The partnership with the Volvo Group is an important product development program and will help meet the increasing demand for natural gas engines and vehicles in the heavy-duty market.’ said David Demers, CEO of Westport Innovations.

As previously disclosed in a press release dated February 27, 2012, under the terms of the agreement, each partner will contribute significant resources and pay for its own people and costs of the program. Westport will lead the program. When the product is launched, Westport will supply its HD system components for an agreed upon amount per engine, comparable to other such arrangements previously announced.

About Westport Innovations Inc.
Westport Innovations Inc. is a leading global supplier of proprietary solutions that allow engines to operate on clean-burning fuels such as compressed natural gas (CNG), liquefied natural gas (LNG), hydrogen, and renewable natural gas (RNG) fuels such as landfill gas and helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). Westport technology offers advanced LNG fueling systems with direct injection natural gas engine technology for heavy-duty vehicles such as highway trucks and off-road applications such as mining and rail. Westport’s joint venture with Cummins Inc., Cummins Westport Inc. designs, engineers and markets spark-ignited natural gas engines for North American transportation applications such as trucks and buses.  Westport LD division is one of the global leaders for natural gas and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) fuel in passenger cars, light-duty trucks and industrial applications such as forklifts. To learn more about our business, visit our website or subscribe to our RSS feed at www.westport.com, or follow us on Twitter @WestportDotCom.

Since 1994, gas stations in areas that did not meet certain air quality standards were required to curb gasoline emissions at the pump with special emissions control systems. Now that many vehicles are equipped to capture these emissions, EPA began on May 10 to phase out the outdated station recovery systems, potentially saving the approximately 31,000 affected gas stations more than $3,000 each year.

For more information, go to http://www.epa.gov/air/ozonepollution/.

Source: Environmental Expert

VANCOUVER — The B.C. Ministry of Energy and Mines today announced theGreenhouse Gas Reduction regulation that advances the adoption and deployment of natural gas vehicles (NGVs) in BC.

The regulation permits a utility to spend up to $62 million on vehicle and ferry incentives, up to $12 million on compressed natural gas (CNG) fuelling stations and up to $30.5 million on liquefied natural gas stations, for a total of $104.5 million.

‘It makes sense to develop a market for natural gas transportation here in B.C. by using our abundant natural gas reserves,’ said Rich Coleman, Minister of Energy and Mines.

‘This regulation will help us build on our global leadership in clean transportation, bringing new jobs and more economic opportunities to the province.’

‘Our clean tech sector is a driving factor in the economic growth of British Columbia, generating $2.5 billion in revenue with a combined payroll estimated at $650 million,’ said Pat Bell, Minister of Jobs, Tourism and Innovation.

‘With this regulation, more companies will integrate B.C.’s world-leading natural gas technologies into their operations, increasing their competitiveness and driving innovation.’

GLOBE Advisors in its West Coast Clean Economy Study released in March 2012, recommended to Pacific Coast Collaborative (PCC) member jurisdictions (British Columbia, California, Oregon and Washington) that supporting more environmentally efficient modes of transportation and use of natural gas for long-haul trucking and ferry fleets would not only promote cleaner forms of transportation, but also would stimulate economic growth along the west coast.

Westport Innovations Inc., a leading supplier of natural gas vehicle technologies believes this important program will benefit British Columbia’s economy, environment and transportation options for industry.

‘This is a positive step that will promote the use of domestic BC natural gas as a transportation fuel, and generate both environmental and economic benefits for our province and residents,’ said David Demers, CEO of Westport Innovations.

‘British Columbia is home to world-class companies that both generate and use natural gas transportation technology, and this program will allow the accelerated adoption of natural gas heavy-duty vehicles.’

This regulation allows utility companies to deliver natural gas transportation programs until March 31, 2017, including the opportunity to:

• Offer incentives to transportation fleets that would use natural gas such as  buses, trucks or ferries
• Build, own and operate compressed natural gas fuelling stations or liquefied natural gas fuelling stations
• Upgrade facilities to provide training to safely maintain natural gas vehicles

The Greenhouse Gas Reduction regulation will promote the use of British Columbia’s abundant natural gas resources as a transportation fuel in heavy-duty transport vehicles, such as trucks, transit buses, school buses, refuse trucks and marine vessels.

The program’s objectives include displacing high carbon fuel, reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and increasing natural gas fueling infrastructure. Natural gas vehicles are a proven technology used across the globe.

Natural gas is 25 to 40 per cent cheaper than gasoline and diesel and produces up to 25 per cent fewer GHG emissions compared to a gasoline or diesel vehicle.

In addition, the Province is offering direct grants of up to $2,500 to purchasers of qualifying CNG vehicles. This is being offered through the $14.3 million Clean Energy Vehicle Program, announced in Nov. 2011.

BC has an abundant supply of low cost and low carbon natural gas. This program will allow local governments and businesses to take advantage of the benefits of natural gas, including lower fueling costs and reduced greenhouse gas emissions.

The Province will require annual reporting on the programs being offered to review success and determine if any changes are required.

Find out more about B.C.’s Natural Gas Strategy here.