Fuel

Already promoting diesels, hybrids and electric vehicles (EV), Volkswagen (VW) is reportedly considering a natural gas vehicle (NGV) model in the United States, drawn by abundant U.S. natural gas supplies. Fueling infrastructure remains a concern of the German automaker, however.

New England power generators will be held responsible for outages based on their economic decisions not to line up deliveries of natural gas or other fuel, but will not be liable if they can demonstrate the fuel/transportation is unavailable, according to a mixed ruling issued by FERC in response to a complaint filed by the New England Power Generators Association (NEPGA).

In the near- and medium-term, liquefied natural gas (LNG) may a transportation fuel market in the marine sector, where globally water-based transportation of goods continues to grow at a robust pace, according to the latest World LNG Report by the International Gas Union (IGU).

On a national basis, compressed natural gas (CNG) as an alternative transportation fuel continued to make progress in mid-August, with developments including new conversion standards in California to hip SUV fleets on the Las Vegas Strip.

Aided by a new state law, NW Natural is accelerating its initiative to expand the use and fueling infrastructure for natural gas vehicles (NGV), and CEO Gregg Kantor, speaking on a 2Q2013 earnings conference call Wednesday, said that there is a statewide interest in developing natural gas as a transportation fuel.

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said shale and other formations might be a safe place to dispose of nuclear waste, specifically spent nuclear fuel (SNF) currently being stored at nuclear power plants around the world.

A coalition of conservation groups on Thursday filed a 60-day notice of intent to sue the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) over its amending of 10 resource management plans (RMP) earlier this year to open more than 800,000 acres for future oil shale and tar sands leasing.

While natural gas is becoming the fuel of choice due to its clean-burning qualities and newfound abundance in North America thanks to shale development, the increased gas demand from multiple sources, including the industrial sector, electric power sector, transportation and liquefied natural gas and pipeline exports, is unlikely to boost the domestic price of the resource substantially, according to a new study titled “New Dynamics of the U.S. Natural Gas Market,” conducted by the Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC).

The appetite for natural gas has extended into areas without extensive pipeline networks through trucking the fuel in the form of compressed natural gas (CNG). It is becoming a growing business, particularly for large industrial businesses.