Natural Gas Vehicles in Full Bloom This Spring

Greg Roche posted on 2010/04/20 |

This is a busy spring season for natural gas vehicles. The industry is full of announcements. Truck manufacturers Freightliner, Kenworth, Peterbilt, Autocar, Capacity, and Kalmar are expanding their line-up of natural gas vehicle offerings. Even Navistar announced their commitment to introduce a natural gas engine. It wasn't that long ago that you couldn't buy a natural gas truck from your dealer, but just look at these recent headlines:

February 9^th - Navistar Pursues Natural Gas for MaxxForce 13 Engines

March 24^th - Peterbilt Launches Complete Lineup of Natural Gas Powered Vehicles

March 24^th - Kenworth Adds T440 Natural Gas Vehicle, Targets Local and Regional Haul, Vocational

March 25^th - Freightliner Trucks Offers Allison Optimized Packages for Business Class M2 112 Natural Gas Models

Not to be outdone, the fleets are busy too. About a year ago AT&T announced the largest corporate commitment yet to natural gas vehicles. AT&T is in the process of deploying 8,000 natural gas vehicles over the next 10 years. They are also making good on this commitment, with many vehicles already deployed. Clean Energy has signed an agreement with AT&T to provide fuel for these new vehicles.

March 11^th (2009) - AT&T to Deploy More Than 15,000 Alternative-Fuel Vehicles

Makes Largest Commitment to Compressed Natural Gas to Date by a U.S. Company

March 31^st - Clean Energy Signs Agreement with AT&T to Provide Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) Fueling Stations to Support AT&T's Nationwide Deployment of 8,000 CNG Fleet Vehicles

Verizon followed suit this week by announcing their commitment to deploy 1,600 alternative fuel vehicles in 2010.

April 12^th - Verizon Launches Comprehensive Sustainability Program to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Conserve Energy

Ryder Truck announced that they will begin deploying over 200 natural gas trucks in the Southern California market.

April 7^th - Ryder Awarded First-of-Its-Kind Natural Gas Heavy Duty Truck Project Using $19.3 Million in Stimulus Funding

UPS, long a corporate leader in deploying natural gas vehicles, continues to expand their fleet of Brown natural gas vehicles.

January 19^th - UPS Deploys 245 New "Green" Trucks

Even hybrid natural gas vehicles are on the horizon.

April 14^th - US Groups to Coordinate Promotion of Natural Gas Hybrid-Electric Vehicles

This dizzying pace shows that fleets are rapidly embracing natural gas as their cheaper, cleaner, and American fuel.