Wells to wheels: Environmental implications of natural gas as a transportation fuel

Journal Article · Tue Jul 25 00:00:00 EDT 2017 · Energy Policy

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2017.07.041· OSTI ID:1393917

Cai, Hao ^[1]; Burnham, Andrew ^[1]; Chen, Rui ^[1]; Wang, Michael ^[1]

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1. Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Energy Systems Division

Expanded use of natural gas (NG) as a transportation fuel in the United States requires understanding its environmental, technological, and economic performance. We analyzed water consumption for NG production in major U.S. shale gas plays from recent reports and studies. Also, we assessed the water consumption, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and air emissions of using compressed and liquefied NG as transportation fuels by three heavyduty NG vehicles (NGV) types from a wells-to-wheels (WTW) perspective, using the Greenhouse gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy use in Transportation (GREET®) model developed at Argonne National Laboratory. We reviewed recent work on quantifying methane leakage in the NG supply chain and vehicle use to improve the estimates of this important factor to GHG emissions of NGVs. These results show that the NGVs could reduce water consumption significantly and offer air emissions reduction benefits compared to their diesel counterparts. WTW GHG emissions of NGVs are largely driven by the vehicle fuel efficiency, and methane leakage rates of the NG supply chain and vehicle end use, and are slightly higher than those of the diesel counterparts with the estimated WTW methane leakage. We also analyzed costs of operating NGVs relative to diesel vehicles and found that the cost-effectiveness of NGVs is impacted by incremental cost of NG storage tanks and price difference between NG and diesel fuels. Our findings for NG as a transportation fuel for different vehicle technologies shed light on their environmental impacts and the economics from the WTW holistic point of view.

• Research Organization: Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE; USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Vehicle Technologies Office (EE-3V)
• Grant/Contract Number: AC02-06CH11357
• OSTI ID: 1393917
• Alternate ID(s): OSTI ID: 22707562; OSTI ID: 1495520
• Journal Information: Energy Policy, Journal Name: Energy Policy Journal Issue: C Vol. 109; ISSN 0301-4215
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Costs
Greenhouse gas emissions
NOx and PM emissions
Natural gas vehicles
Water consumption