1. Almost 80 countries from all five continents use NGV/CNG.
2. More than 10 million vehicles run on this noble fuel today.
3. Cars refuel at over 16 thousand filling stations spread throughout 2,400 cities worldwide.
4. There are 2,600 service stations under construction. By end 2010, 20,000 fuel dispensing points will supply methane for vehicles.
5. 180 OEM NGVs are offered by vehicle manufacturers. OEMs’ interest is growing: Ford, Scania, Opel, GM, Mercedes Benz, Toyota, Hyundai, Tata, Fiat –among others- are clear examples.
6. The relation oil reserves-demand has reached the critical point or “peak oil” while a similar situation is not foreseen in the case of natural gas.
7. Natural gas exploration keeps expanding into both traditional wells and compact sand deposits. Coal bed methane constitutes a new alternative. Methane hydrate reserves on the sea bed are countless and several times larger than traditional reserves.
8. Conventional gas pipelines networks continue to proliferate. Underwater pipelines are built across oceans and others over mountain ranges.
9. The use of mobile natural gas pipelines –on trucks or trailers- makes NGV/CNG available where there are no physical pipelines either because of long distances or because of the scale of the demand.
10. In typical NGV/CNG refueling stations, owners do not have to rely on the arrival of trucks for the fuel supply since it is constantly provided by the pipeline.
11. It is possible for some users to refill their NGV/CNG cars at home because there are dispensers that take natural gas directly from the domestic distribution network.
12. Liquefaction and regasification terminals allow –through LNG technology- that natural gas arrives at any place of the planet. LNG carriers guarantee its global distribution and the possibility of providing support for larger supply. LNG transport does not entail the huge risks of ecological disaster that oil poses.
13. NGV/CNG industry involves an 800,000 people labour force worldwide, between technicians and workers.
