A Massachusetts company making natural gas vehicle (NGV) conversion kits on Thursday bought a California company’s Bakken-based natural gas liquid (NGL) processing technology, which it plans to use to fuel trucks and rigs working in the North Dakota oilfields using gas that was previously flared.

Now holding the strategic license agreement it obtained from Cupertino, CA-based Trident Resources LLC, Lynnfield, MA-based American Power Group (APG) plans to expand its “Fueled by Flare” initiative in North Dakota where the state has set aggressive goals for capturing rather than flaring gas associated with oil production.

“Capturing flared gas from remote and stranded wellsites is a growing regulatory necessity,” said an APG spokesperson, emphasizing that Trident’s approach is a proven mobile NGL technology with a track record in the Bakken region.

APG signed a license agreement with Trident gaining the exclusive worldwide rights to commercialize its proprietary NGL technology, and in addition, it bought “substantially all” of Trident’s operating assets, including two existing mobile NGL operating systems, which are currently serving remote or stranded wellsites for one of the top five exploration/production companies in the Bakken.

The company also has plans and a $3.25 million verbal commitment from several shareholders and board members to build two additional NGL operating systems, it said.

These additional systems “will include the first NGL system with the capability to convert the unconventional Bakken flared gas into a premium quality natural gas for all local APG dual-fuel stationary and NGV applications,” the spokesperson said.

“We are very comfortable moving into this new vertically integrated space given the fact that approximately 85% of APG’s North American duel-fuel oil rig conversions are currently operating on conditioned wellhead gas,” said APG CEO Lyle Jensen. He said there is “a very addressable market” of thousands of heavy-duty trucks supporting the oil/gas production activity in North Dakota.