Compressed natural gas stations have the capacity to supply 40 million cubic meters of CNG, but at present are operating at half capacity as lesser number of motorists are buying the eco-friendly fuel, managing director or National Iranian Oil Products Distribution Company said.
“Almost 20 million cubic meters of CNG is consumed every day,” ILNA quoted Mohammadreza Mousavikhah as saying.
Production of bi-fuel vehicles has stopped and the price of gasoline has not increased (despite recent speculations), so it is not economically viable for the people to buy CNG, he added.
Price discrepancy between gasoline and CNG is 40%, whereas logically CNG prices should not be more than 20% of gasoline.
Motorists pay 10,000 rials (10 cents) for a liter of gasoline while one cubic meter of CNG costs 6,000 rials (6 cents).
CNG is natural gas under pressure, mostly made of methane, and is odorless, colorless, tasteless and non-corrosive. There are over 2,400 CNG stations across the country.
"Of the 20 million vehicles, over 5 million have hybrid CNG engines. This is while the share of CNG in fuel consumption is hardly 20%...The bulk comes from gasoline.”
Iranians burn an average of 100 million liters of gasoline every day, of which some 10 million liters are imported. CNG consumption hovers around 20 million liters per day.
Experts say cutting the price of compressed natural gas for motorists is imperative if the government want to reduce gasoline consumption.
More than $2.4 billion has been invested to expand CNG use in the last decade and as a result domestic CNG consumption has increased 53-fold.
The government is moving ahead with plans to promote CNG as a clean alternative to other eco-unfriendly fossil fuels. Natural gas vehicles produce at least 20% less harmful emissions than gasoline-powered cars.
However, the process of increasing the number of CNG stations has come to a halt. Pointing to the cost of CNG equipment and maintenance, Mousavikhah said private enterprise is not interested in putting money in the CNG filling stations simply because of high and rising costs (especially land prices) and shrinking profit margins.
The same is true for gasoline stations. For example, in Tehran the number of cars has increased several times over the past 40 years but the shortage of petrol pumps is conspicuous throughout the sprawling capital of close to 12 million people and four million cars.
