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David Gardner’s “No Choice Revolution” Natural Gas Stock

Well, the copywriters over the Motley Fool seem to have been working overtime to churn out ads for the Motley Fool Stock Advisor … so I guess the lights will stay on late into the night at Gumshoe HQ, too. What is it they’re pitching now, and why does it have so many of my readers revved up?

Here’s the part that catches your attention:

“The simple fuel injector (pictured below) could power the “No Choice” revolution…

“And the ONE SMALL, PUBLICLY TRADED COMPANY that makes it has a patent portfolio that dwarfs those of Siemens, Toyota, Ford, and CAT — all now clamoring to get a piece of the action…

“On March 30th at Georgetown University, President Obama publicly backed this small company’s mission — and sent its shares soaring…

“Here’s the important part in all this for you: this stock is still poised like a spring, waiting on a congressional announcement that could come as early as TOMORROW…”

TOMORROW?!?! OH NO OH NO WHERE’S MY WALLET? MUST SUBSCRIBE NOW!

>ahemDavid Gardner's "top dog" and "first mover" companies in a space where there is a huge unmet need (might it also be a "Spiffy Pop?” Hope springs eternal) …

“David instead invests like a venture capitalist — focusing on ‘first movers’ and “top dogs” capable of breathtaking innovation… often delivering lower consumer prices and improving the lives of millions and millions of people in the process.

“But let’s back up a second. Here’s what I mean by a ‘first mover’: A company with a product or service so revolutionary it disrupts an existing industry or creates an entirely new one. And a “top dog” is a company that dominates its industry and basically has no peer.

“On the rare occasion you find a company that is both a top dog and a first mover — the chances are pretty good you’ve found your next big winner. And that’s exactly what David projects for the small ‘no choice’ fuel company I’ve been telling you about…

“Keep in mind, though, the time needs to be right if rare, possibly life-changing profits are your goal… there needs to be a historic need for a solution. And a particular company uniquely positioned to deliver it. ”

And then, in teasing us with a few more details about the specific company Gardner is pitching, we also learn where the “no choice” bit came from:

“This little company, David Gardner’s top pick for new money now, is the technology leader in the conversion of diesel-fueled engines to natural gas.

“Its proprietary technology centers around the fuel injection system, it has all the patents sewn up, and the lion’s share of the natural gas engine market already locked down!

“The New York Times writes, ‘this isn’t pie-in-the-sky technology: there are already 12 million vehicles around the world that use either liquefied or compressed natural gas, though only 140,000 in the U.S.’

“Meaning, we’re in the very early stages here in the U.S. of a landmark shift to what one analyst at bank Societe Generale calls the fuel of ‘no choice’…

“That’s because it’s really our only viable course. Take a look: there is enough known natural gas in North America to last centuries… and it won’t involve a future of transferring huge amounts of wealth to Middle East sheikdoms while competing with the Chinese for imported oil.”

And the urgency?

“But a quick word of warning: Wall Street is beginning to catch on. In March, Morgan Stanley issued its first report on this little company…

“JP Morgan began covering this stock in April with a 42-page ‘initiation report.’ And other firms are following suit as we speak.

“Now I have to ask you… what would make the biggest financial firms in the world take notice of a small-cap company like this? I’d say it could only be one thing: they project an epic move.”

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So what is, in their words, “David Gardner’s #1 Stock for the Coming ‘No Choice’ Fuel Revolution?”

Toss all that into the Thinkolator, and we find the answer right quick: This is our old favorite Westport Innovations (WPRT)

I’ve owned Westport in the past and I profiled it for the Irregulars a few years ago when it was still trading primarily in Canada — they are indeed the leader in heavy natural gas engines, they have a great and lucrative joint venture with Cummins to build midsize natural gas engines for fleets (garbage trucks, UPS trucks, city buses, etc.), which is really where the core of the natural gas conversion has taken place (fleets are the “low hanging fruit,” in large part because their vehicles generally stay in a small geographic area and are easy to refuel without needing a big fueling station network). And they’re counting on heavy trucks to supply their next phase of growth and help them become profitable — which means they depend a lot on the political landscape …

… which is probably why this Motley Fool ad is running right now. There was a good article in the Wall Street Journal today that summed up the basic state of natural gas for heavy truck engines, and the short summary is “depends on big government subidies.” These engines cost far more than competing engines, especially in the heavy truck business where Westport doesn’t have quite as much economy of scale as they do in their Cummins joint venture, and the stock has waxed and waned based largely on changing subsidies and on sentiment about future subsidies. The base argument for natural gas engines is strongly in an uptrend right now, not just because of energy security but because the engines can operate at a lower cost than diesel engines because of the last few years’ disconnect between natural gas and oil prices (which itself is thanks to shale gas, for the most part), but I don’t know how to handicap the future for natural gas engine subsidies in a world of competing priorities and budget pressures.

The urgency of the email builds around the potential for natural gas legislation being passed, as you might expect, but there is often news from Westport — unfortunately for them, the non-political news seems to have limited ability to move the stock since the non-political news doesn’t yet create earnings (they’ve not had a profitable year, so announcing that Caterpillar is “evaluating” their technology for their high-horsepower fleet, like they did yesterday, doesn’t really count as enticing news yet)

I do like Westport and the technology, and I have suggested the shares to the Irregulars in the past (though that was several years ago, and I would have been scared out of the stock during California’s fiscal crisis — their original goal to become profitable in 2009 depended on rapid adoption of natural gas drayage trucks at the California ports, and I was worried about CA’s commitment during their budget crisis), and if you think natural gas infrastructure buildout will happen on the highways, and, more importantly, if you believe that we’re on the dawn of a long-term system of stable and predictable government support for “no choice” natural gas as a transportation fuel, including, probably most importantly, very good subsidies for natural gas trucks, then I bet Westport will do really, really well. If subsidies are cut or don’t get written into law at the level that fleet owners need to be motivated toward conversion, then WPRT’s stock could certainly suffer — the natural transition to natural gas as a transport fuel, without aggressive subsidies and infrastructure support from the government, could easily not happen, or could happen far more slowly than a company like WPRT needs to generate profits. There was also, coincidentally, a free article from a different author over at the Fool this week that mentions WPRT as well as Clean Energy Fuels (CLNE, the company most levered to building out natural gas fueling stations), you can see that here if you like.

I’ve said before that if I could buy Cummins Westport, their JV with Cummins, I’d do that in a second because having every city bus and garbage truck on natural gas is the easiest transition, and the one that needs the least US government subsidizing … but we can’t do that, and I haven’t been confident enough in Westport’s heavy truck business to buy back into the shares in recent years. Their share of Cummins Westport makes up the vast majority of both revenue and earnings for Westport, but it’s the heavy investment in building up their partnerships with other groups, particularly their heavy duty truck business, that drags on the revenue and prohibits that Cummins Westport profit from hitting the bottom line (it’s also, on the flip side, the investment that could potentially turn them into a far larger company). Is this another case like Netflix, where I’m being a fuddy duddy about a Stock Advisor pick that someday goes ballistic as a half-dozen or so of his ideas have in past years? Or is this another one of those “forgotten” picks that aren’t going to be mentioned in future teasers as 500% gainers?

Westport, absent profit or dramatic revenue bumps, moves a lot on sentiment for natural gas vehicles, and on investors sniffing the air in the corridors of Congress — seems like the political side is actually moving in their favor now, though the stock is down a bit from it’s highs, but I’ve thought that before and been wrong. This is a billion dollar company that, despite a multitude of partnerships with heavy truck, engine, and equipment companies, really needs a bit of a jump start to get to profitability, and the US government is the most likely source of that spark. That’s just my opinion, of course — your mileage may differ. Let us know with a comment below if you see that jump start coming soon from Capitol Hill, or if you think the technology leadership will evaporate or political follow-through will be lacking.

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Taf Tac
Guest
January 28, 2012 11:08 am

What ever happened to that gentleman that invented the engine that could get 100 miles to a tank full of water where the hydrogen and oxygen produced by hydrolysis was in large quantities? Did someone actually poison him?

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wemco94
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wemco94
January 28, 2012 2:22 pm
Reply to  Taf Tac

EVERYONE has an acquaintance who has a friend who has a cousin who has a neighbor who is the guy that invented the engine that goes 100 miles per gallon of water. NO ONE has ever actually met the inventor, or seen the engine …………

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Judith
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Judith
February 2, 2012 8:38 pm
Reply to  wemco94

Wemco94@ I’ve met one guy that invented a water engine back in Spain, he had a backer and WAS afraid for his life. He seemed genuine, but I never did see the engine:-)

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matthew
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matthew
February 11, 2012 10:00 am

I seen in thailand, alot of taxis and trucks have converted to natural gas, due to government subsidy program, but, it does not mean that this particular stock will benefit. I imagine people like shell oil, also sell gas. So, no real change..
And apparently to convert costs arround 2000 dollars, so, i cannot see where the big bucks are to be made.

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Buck Burgett
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Buck Burgett
February 11, 2012 12:02 pm

I found the article very interesting indeed. But the comments from everyone is what makes this research experience so enjoyable. The information gleamed from the 37 responses are so valuable in making a decision on buying stock for a compressed gas convertor kit. The different variables that would have an effect on the stock such as safety etc.
I am from a small town in Colorado, we had a family that used propane for fueling their cars and this happened in the middle 60s’. Thank God their family car was not involved in a car accident.

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ActualAlternativeFuelUser
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ActualAlternativeFuelUser
February 11, 2012 4:50 pm

Buy the stock or not, but please leave the science to people who can spell, and know what they’re talking about. Natural Gas and Propane both have 6% lower power potential than gasoline, true. However, by increasing the compression in the engine, you gain that power back. You can accomplish this quite easily in a diesel engine by increasing the turbocharger’s output. Also, you DO NOT use 6x the fuel, nor have to carry 1000 lbs of fuel. I currently own and operate a propane powered Jeep which I converted myself for $300. It is a simple process to convert and fill. I get the same range from the same amount of propane as gasoline and is smog-free. Also, the tank is 1/4″ thick steel cylinder – please read a physics book and figure out how hard it would be to puncture a cylinder that’s pressurized at 350psi. Short answer: a lot harder than your car’s plastic gas tank, so who’s driving the bomb …
Back to the social and economic aspects of this: most states have laws prohibiting conversion to alternative fuels, propane and natural gas, without CARB numbered kits, etc. That can be overcome … but the real problem is where do you get your fuel? A trucker or a soccer mom, either one, doesn’t want to have to travel out of their way to get fuel. Until you see LNG filling stations on I-80, this sector isn’t going anywhere. Buy the stock, sit on it for 10 years and hope the Fool is right, but if you don’t understand the technology behind Liquid Natural Gas or Liquid Propane fueled vehicles, follow the rest of the sheep.

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Jim
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Jim
February 12, 2012 12:30 pm

Currently trading at 10 times book value near it’s 5 yr. high with losses projected to continue….I wish I would have jumped on this before The Fool stared pitching it but I think I’ll go to Vegas before investing in WPRT

m
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m
February 13, 2012 8:16 am

One of the hurdles being forgotten in all of this is the current state of the NG pipeline infrastructure today throughout the lower 50 states. A rather substantial upgrade will need to happen to major supply lines , This is one of the detractors forgotten about when pushing for natural gas conversions the major players hate to pump money into these lines when they are current cash cows paid for years ago.

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Some guy who knows
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Some guy who knows
February 15, 2012 4:04 pm

The misinformation in this thread is shocking.
1) Liquid Natural Gas is not a “gel”, it is a clear liquid that flows freely. And it is not 6 to 1 or 6 % of any petroleum fuel. On a volumetric basis it holds slightly more than half the energy than the same unit of diesel. 1.7 to 1 . . . Look it up.
2) WPRT is not the only player doing diesel engines, just the highest cost. The lion’s share of their revenue does not come from their IP.
3) Natural gas vehicles are safer than gasoline by a lot, and also safer than diesel. They are not explosive although high pressure with CNG is a concern. Actually stored as high as 250 Bar (3600 psi). LNG is max pressure of 15 Bar (230 psi). The low temperature of LNG at -260 F is the other safety concern.
4) The economic savings for vehicle operating costs is real. Waiting for tax credits is bad. There are other technologies that can be paid back without subsidies.

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Fonz56
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Fonz56
March 13, 2012 2:27 pm

Not real sure about Fools theory’s. In the video it pointed out how much stock they recommended have gained. However, I just happen to own one of them, MRVL purchased in 2/18/10 at $18.02. Video said Disney purchased MRVL and stock soared. I just unloaded my MRVL at $15.03 after holding it almost 2 years. I don’t know when Disney bought MRVL but it wasn’t while I owned it.

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Sid "The Kid" Crosby
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Sid "The Kid" Crosby
July 15, 2012 11:09 pm
Reply to  Fonz56

You bought the wrong stock! Marvel is the comic book company turned movie production empire. I think u bought the hard drive/chip maker.

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Jcat
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Jcat
February 24, 2012 11:51 am

Im Short @ 44.75. If they “PUMP” (pun intended) This dream to $55 I`ll at least double my Short Position! It`s a bloated piece of garbage!

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Houston Guy
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Houston Guy
March 13, 2012 11:48 am

Beyond all the science and all the anecdotal evidence, and despite the competing points of view on this thread, there is one critical piece of undisputed evidence for everybody to consider here. The article above was written in May 2011. In that article, it quotes the Fool as saying the stock was about to jump “pending Congressional action as early as TOMORROW.” (That would be around the May 12-15 2011 time frame). I just received an almost EXACTLY SIMILAR email from the Fool today, March 13, 2012! Well, that is amazing. So, grab your wallets and buy some stock!! Because on May 12, 2011, or on March 14, 2012, the stock is about to TAKE OFF!! I’m sure on April 15, 2013 it will also be “about to take off!” and on November 1, 2014, it will likewise be “pending IMPORTANT CONGRESSIONAL ACTION!” ACT NOW! Sale is almost over!!! BLOWOUT SALE! LIMITED TIME OFFER!! LAST CHANCE!! DON’T MISS THIS DEAL!!! Etc. Of course, if all the sheeple stampede to buy this stock, it WILL look like the price went up. Just in time for everybody to get fleeced. And then, you may even notice some insiders selling their stock in the next month or so. While its high. They do that, you know, to pay for their kids’ tuition or to buy a new vacation home. They unload some stock, right after some big Press Release and Analyst push. Then, when it plummets, they buy it back up. If you want to finance WPRT’s executives’ vacation homes, then go ahead and take the FOOL at its word. Science and Anecdotes are nice. But don’t ever buy something that the Fool tells you to buy. By the time you are reading it, the Fool has already picked up the insiders’ game plan and is helping push something for their benefit. I have no faith in the objectivity or benevolence of the Fool.

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Phil Menges
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Phil Menges
March 13, 2012 1:43 pm
Reply to  Houston Guy

I agree with you 100% on the Fool. Frankly, I wish the Fool had never adopted WPRT into its circle of “insider” stocks to hype (for money, of course).

But this is not about what the Fool either hypes or trashes. It’s all about Westport Innovations, which has raised lots of revenues over the past 2 or 3 years in order to further expand development of those heavy-duty CNG engines. If the WPRT principles enjoy their vacation homes along the way, more power to them! (They’ve earned it.)

I own both WPRT and CLNE (future of the nat gas highway) because I believe in these stocks. I just wish the Motley Fool would go away.

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dave
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dave
March 13, 2012 1:18 pm

I own a car wrap business and wrapped a new Honda Civic for a local gas natural gas re-seller last summer. He can use natural gas from his home natural gas system. Fill up kit costs about $3000-4000 to install. Takes overnight to “fill” the tank. Only commercial “quick fill” station in town is city owned fill station for their vehicles. The natural gas tank takes up about 1/2 the trunk in the Honda version that I saw. Max range for the vehicle is about 250 or so miles. Natural gas equivalent price vs. gasoline was about (and I mean about) $1.65/gallon. With tax credits etc bottom line was the car was about $3000-4000 more than a similar gasoline powered Civic. Predicted the engine would last much longer because it burns clean so clean. Oil virtually never gets dirty. Only change it because it breaks down due to hear in use.

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Rolf
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Rolf
March 13, 2012 3:42 pm

David Gardner isn’t talking about WPRT. He says, the Company “is the technology leader in the conversion of diesel-fueled engines to natural gas.” Westport doesn’t do that. I think it’s OMTK.

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fonz56
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fonz56
March 26, 2012 10:36 am

Once again,,,,,, Westport has/is as I understand it developing fuel injectors for engines. Seems to me if you look at the current engines which are mostly fuel injected and became almost the sole source of power for cars and trucks in the late 1990’s. WPRT still doesnt have an natural gas engine developed or anything? Need to hire new R & D engineers. New cell phones have been developed from scratch, been to moon and back several times,,,,,,too me doesn’t seem like a good investment.

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Scunnerous
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Scunnerous
April 24, 2012 6:33 am
Reply to  fonz56

For CNG injection you need a completely different fuel injector – one which can sit sealed while under pressure even when the engine is idle, which can meter a gas accurately – a much different proposition from a liquid and which will do that without degrading under in-cylinder conditions of temperature and pressure; I believe most modern big diesels are direct-injected. It also has to do the above reliably enough to pass emissions on VOs, i.e. minor leakage as well as normal exhaust emissions. Of course any ECU programming would have to be re-calibrated too. As for the engine itself, I don’t see why any changes would be necessary, though optimal operation might require a different compression ratio from diesel fuel operation. The injector might have to have an integrated form of spark plug, since CNG will not auto-ignite at diesel auto-ignition pressures.

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zameer
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zameer
March 27, 2012 11:22 am

the name of the cng compnay

rob
Member
rob
April 14, 2012 5:03 pm

there would not be a need for as many fueling stations for cng if it were possible to use Lng, how does one keep Lng at or below -161 deg F. when traveling along interstate 40 in the desert? The floor of my truck gets hot enough where you cannot stand on it barefooted when traveling past joplin missouri in the summer months. Cng’s bigest problem is capacity, This is why its used only in regional or local areas, A team truck (2 drivers) can travel over 1400 miles per day, How many miles would a class 8 truck travel on cng befor needing refueling? Considering the current DOT hours of service rules, I need to travel 550 to 600 miles per day without refueling. if needing to refule more than every other day Cng would not help me at all.

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Barak
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Barak
July 3, 2012 2:42 pm

George, as soon as bullets become a major traffic hazard, we’ll probably have other things to worry about besides the ng tank. But until then, you’re fixated on the wrong thing. During an accident the worry is that the tank or a gas line becomes compromised and leaks natural gas into the air. Eventually the natural gas will become diluted enough, and a spark from an outside source (perhaps some dimwit standing too close to the accident dialing 911 on a cellphone) will cause the air/fuel mixture to ignite or explode, not the tank itself. Of course, once the tank itself has become enveloped in flame and starts to warm up, then you’ll need to worry about another scenario, a so-called BLEVE (Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion).

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Todd
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Todd
July 15, 2012 2:59 pm

The premise is true and the technology has been in place for years but without serious governmental infrastructure support there is no way this could come into reality. It really doesn’t matter if we have an “endless supply” of natural gas, if it will run your car or not, (and it can, that is a fact, it will) but can you pull over and fill up your gas tank at the next gas station? Right now the answer is no. I think this stock will be interesting to watch but a buy would be difficult until after the next election……To many oil company lobbyist donate big bucks to Congress. I liken it to the “War on Drugs” – Oil employs way to many people for government to ever do away or compete with it.

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Sid "The Kid" Crosby
Guest
Sid "The Kid" Crosby
July 15, 2012 11:31 pm

My sister works in Washington D.C. as an OPEC advisor to the current administration and she has mentioned several times that the topic of NG is a highly contested debate within all circles of government (as we all know) . However, she mentioned something EXTREMELY interesting yesterday. Although I would think she wasn’t at all at liberty to extend such information to a family member, a few US Senators and policy makers are now most certainly going to use this issue to tip the balance towards re-election. More specifically, the go ahead approval of the Keystone XL Pipeline construction on hold in Congress. Trans-Canada has been pushing for this for a few years now and although Obama had postponed the decision to 2013, and to the STRONG opposition of OPEC executives and advisors such as herself, the current turmoil in global markets has pushed the current administration to begin implementing radical changes to the proposed plans to the NG infrastructure in the US. A major component of this, is what has prevented the overall acceptance of NG as a primary form of energy consumption in the US…US subsidies for companies to promote/create the much needed infrastructure to support NG in the US. Folks I am telling you right now, start looking to take positions in the many companies that are about to benefit from NG (and not renewable resources as the current administration had premised their campaign on 4 years ago) being the new platform of energy independence in the United States.

Ironmaster
Guest
Ironmaster
October 4, 2012 8:21 am

Gerry is correct. Real Estate for the tanks is the issue. I have been around this technology for a long time and aside from the industry needing more infrastructure, CnG is not harmful to an engine, but to go as far as gasoline or diesel, you need a much bigger tank. Dedicated fuel systems don’t have the infrastructure to support them so dual fuel systems are necessary. This adds to the cost.

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jamespmarquart
jamespmarquart
March 31, 2013 4:10 pm
Reply to  Ironmaster

Impressive. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and providing a novice with your insight. Best wishes.

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David Riley
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David Riley
October 15, 2012 5:53 am

This is a long reply so I’ll summarize it here and if you would like to know the reasoning behind my opinions you can read the rest.

If the question at hand is whether it is reasonable to invest in the LNG fuel market, e.g: does it have a growth future and can one be confident of a reasonable return on investment. I think the answer is yes.

If the question you ask is whether you can get a 10 fold increase in your investment in no time at all, as some suggest, I say that’s a fools question and you will soon be parted from your money. Being seduced by promises of incredible returns is the surest way to contribute to someone else’s market success.

Compared to gasoline and diesel LNG has much to recommend it. First it is a domestic fuel so we don’t put our security at risk depending on it. It is adaptable to most current vehicles at the manufacturer level with well understood technology. It would not require as large a change in currently used technology as any other proposed solutions. It does not use food for fuel which adds a cost to bio solutions that is often not considered. It is clean. LNG is one of the lowest carbon emitters of all fossil fuels. We’ve got lots of it.

There seems to be some confusion between natural gas (LNG) and propane (LPG). LPG comes out of the ground as one of the components of crude oil. It is separated out at the refinery. In years past it was burnt off as a waste product but no more. When it was waste it was really cheap. Today it is about equal to gasoline and diesel on an energy cost basis. LNG does not mix well with crude oil and comes out of the ground separate. It needs little or no processing. It has no odor so somewhere along the way they make it stink so you know if it’s leaking. It may have some sulfur in it which is undesirable so it may need to be processed to remove the sulfur. Otherwise what comes out of the ground is what you use at home and could use in your motor vehicle.

I’ve been considering alternative fuels since I was 15 y.o. working at a gas station that sold propane for 40% of the price of gasoline. My boss converted his truck because his cost was half what he was selling it for. At today’s prices LPG doesn’t make much sense. If I could use LNG though it might be different because it is a lot cheaper. As a motor fuel LPG and LNG are a lot alike.

I am a master mechanic. I have worked on all of the variants talked about here. Here are some of the things I’ve learned over the years:

Gasoline is not any specific thing. Any blend of liquids that gives the desired properties can be sold as gasoline. One of the most redeeming virtues of gasoline is it’s narrow combustibility range. If the mixture is just a little too rich or too lean it won’t burn. As a liquid it is 100% nonflammable. Only when it mixes with the right amount of air is there any danger. That means gasoline spills are much less dangerous than some other fuels.

Propane, or LPG, is a single chemical or can be mixed with a few other chemicals with very similar properties. As a direct replacement for gasoline LPG has many pluses and a few minuses. I have worked on engines that have run exclusively on propane. The oil never gets dirty. What you drain out after 10K miles looks just like what you put back in. The exhaust system is clean as a whistle. Combustion chambers stay clean, Spark plugs never foul. Propane has an octane rating of about 106. If gasoline use is eliminated the compression can be increased significantly yielding improved efficiency, meaning more power and mpg. It burns very clean, producing little pollution. On the down side propane has about 90% of the energy that gasoline has. As a consequence if the engine remains the same as a gasoline engine power and economy suffer about a 10% drop. Propane has nothing to lubricate valve seats. Older engines needed to have a fuel that left a coating on the valves to keep them from wearing out too fast. Modern engines solve the problem with better valve materials so the issue has largely gone away but LPG engines still need a valve job sooner than gasoline engines. Since the engine stays so clean inside many other parts last longer with LPG. I’d call it a draw. All gaseous fuels need a pressure tank to hold the fuel. That means it has to have a shape that can take the pressure. LPG pressure is in the neighborhood of 100 psi so it’s not too bad but still the tank has to be a cylinder or something similar. The required shape limits the location and size of the tank. A gasoline or bio fuel tank that simply holds a liquid can be formed to fill any available space so more fuel can be carried. On the safety front any gaseous fuel that is spilled will immediately mix with the air and become combustible. LPG also has a slightly wider range of combustibility than gasoline so it is more dangerous.

I have seen the Mythbusters tests of LPG tank safety. There have been two of them. They don’t apply to motor fuel situations. As it is, the NHTSA says that fewer than 1/2 of 1% of all accidents involve fire or water. Good for gasoline, bad for Hollywood, hard for anything else to match.

Natural gas, or CNG, is almost identical to LPG as a motor fuel in most respects. It is primarily a single chemical (methane). It has even a higher octane rating so a purpose built engine can have efficiency advantages. There are strategies to use it as a replacement for either gasoline or diesel. If you have gas heat in your home it is entirely possible to have a small compressor in your garage that would take what comes to your house in the gas pipe and liquefy it making it unnecessary to find and patronize a fuel station. I’m not certain the price saving would justify the compressor cost for an individual but at least it’s an option. For a fleet, I think it is the only way to go. The big negative for CNG is pressure. It either has to be very cold or under a lot of pressure to liquify. That means expensive tanks but they are available. I think the proven tech and economics make CNG a sure bet for the future but not the only choice as some suggest. With it’s higher pressures CNG has to be viewed as less safe than LPG .

Bio fuels like ethanol are currently made from food. It seems a poor trade off to turn food into fuel. More over there can be less energy in the bio fuel than went into it’s production. All of this could change soon when cellulosic ethanol becomes viable but for now it’s just politics. Methanol isn’t made from food but it has less energy per gallon than ethanol. Because alcohol is electrically conductive and gasoline is not there can be corrosion and electrical problems. The issue needs to be handled at the design stage and has been for those vehicles marketed as gasohol friendly. Alcohols contain less energy per gallon than gasoline so mpg is inherently lower. Alcohols contain some oxygen which they release when they burn. This makes it possible to use more alcohol and get more power from the same engine. Alcohols burn very clean like LNG and CNG. Liquid, bio fuels are less hazardous than gaseous fuels. Alcohols have a special safety problem though. They burn with a clear flame and no smoke. It is quite possible to have a big alcohol fire and not know it. Additives can fix this. Bio fuel has significant issues but they are well understood. The solutions are in place. It is the political clout behind bio fuel that makes its future a certainty though.

Hydrogen is often touted as the fuel of the future. I think not. Hydrogen is a very tough gas to contain. It takes thousands of psi, powerful adsorbents or extreme cold to store any worthwhile amount. While it’s true that hydrogen is the most abundant substance in the cosmos, it’s not here on earth. In our environment the main source of hydrogen is water. There are two ways to get hydrogen out of water. One is to heat the water REALLY hot which results in a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen gasses instead of water. Before the gasses cool they have to be separated or they will just recombine back into water. Almost nobody does this. The other way is to run a current through the water. Hydrogen will collect at one electrode and oxygen at the other. Hydrogen then is essentially an electricity storage medium like a battery. It can also be extracted from fossil fuels but again almost nobody does that. The hydrogen can be burnt in an engine, returning about 20% of the energy put in, or it can be used in a fuel cell of an electric vehicle returning about 90% of the energy. A battery can do the same thing and it can be charged from any outlet, given enough time. Hydrogen is energy dense. More energy per pound than any chemical I know of until you take into account the weight of the storage tank. Even then it beats batteries by a wide margin. For now. When the infrastructure issue is considered though I don’t believe thousands of hydrogen generating and dispensing stations will be built before better batteries make them obsolete. Hydrogen has the widest flammability range and highest pressures of all the fuels discussed here. It has to be very well protected and controlled to be safe.

Like gasoline diesel fuel is no particular substance but rather a collection of chemicals that result in a liquid with certain properties. There are actually wells that produce crude good enough to use as diesel without refining. It aught to be cheap but for various reasons it isn’t. Diesel fuel, whether petro or bio, is almost nonflammable in most situations and is the safest fuel here after straight vegetable oil. Diesel tends to contain a lot of sulfur naturally which makes it oily. Some fuel systems depend on that oiliness for lubrication. Unfortunately the sulfur also causes sulfur dioxide emissions which contribute to air pollution. Take out the sulfur and some fuel systems will wear out very quickly from lack of lubrication. Enter bio-diesel.

Bio-diesel is made from various plant and animal hydrocarbons that are usually oil like to begin with. That means much of it could have been food. The food can be directly burned in some engines but tends to cause serious problems for others. With some simple processing the food gets converted into a liquid that has some highly desirable fuel properties and fewer problems. It’s cetane rating is very high and diesel engines running on straight bio-diesel can be very smooth and quiet. It is very clean and tends to clean up old dirty fuel systems. It is very oily. As little as 5% mixed with petro-diesel can make up for the oiliness lost when sulfur is removed from petro-diesel. The molecules in bio-diesel attack some kinds of rubber and turn the rubber into goo. You need good fuel hoses and seals. At about 30 degrees most bio-diesel turns into bio-butter and stops flowing. These problems have known solutions but they have to be dealt with either by the manufacturer or by a mechanic in the field. By now nearly all diesel has some bio component to make up for the low sulfur content of modern fuel so one way or another the negatives have been resolved. From a safety standpoint bio-diesel is about like petro-diesel and vegetable oil is so hard to burn it is nearly inert. Bio-diesel has a certain future as a patch for low sulfur petro-diesel and as a stand alone fuel.

I believe the real future of transportation it battery-electric vehicles. If the right batteries were available today I think there wouldn’t even be a discussion of other fuels. Advanced batteries could make unreliable renewable sources of electricity like wind and solar more viable. Compared to petroleum based fuels and the inefficient way we use them, electricity is cheap. New thorium fueled nuclear reactors that produce very little radioactive waste and actually consume existing stockpiles are under construction. Nuclear power could easily be the ultimate source for future energy to charge advanced batteries. That’s a bit down the road though so there is a window for many other alternatives. LNG has a place in that window but eventually as a carbon source it will be doomed.

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Gummyfish
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Gummyfish
June 23, 2013 3:58 pm

Davis Gardner is at it again with his “No Choice Revolution”. This morning I got an email from Motley Fool touting this again. Guess he still believes. There was also an article about nat gas as a fuel here, http://www.exxonmobilperspectives.com/2012/03/22/natural-gas-cars-a-look-under-the-hood/?utm_source=Outbrain&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Perspectives_-_Tier_1 check it out. It makes a good case for diesel and gasoline.

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