Use of natural gas in cars to start next year — DOE

Commercial use of compressed natural gas by the transport sector will start next year, the Department of Energy recently announced.

Energy Secretary Rapahel Lotilla said the start of the commercial operation of the CNG mother-daughter station by June 2007 will finally launch the government's Natural Gas Vehicles for Public Transport Pilot Project.

Arroyo has actively promoted the use of natural gas in public transport since early last year as part of her administration's program to ease the country's dependence on imported oil, the price of which is volatile as to affect the country's economy.

Lotilla said the promotion and increased use of alternative transport fuels, like the CNG, would help lessen the country's dependence on imported fuel. The transport sector consumes about 56 percent of the country's total oil requirements.

The government's natural gas for public transport project was introduced last year when President Arroyo and Lotilla led the test run of CNG-run buses in Malacañang.

Between December 2005 and first quarter of 2006, some 200 units of CNG-fuelled buses arrived in the country to be a part of the public transport system in Metro Manila.

The government said the project would be replicated in the rest of Luzon and other parts of the country within the next few years.

Pilipinas Shell chairman Ed Chua committed earlier that his firm's CNG operations will start next year.

Lotilla acknowledged Shell's commitment to assist bus operators that imported CNG-run buses, acquired through loans, in anticipation of the start of the project last year that was temporarily held back at the time due to safety considerations. - Wenna A. Berondo