Assessment of costs and benefits of flexible and alternative fuel use in the US transportation sector

Technical Report · Mon Jul 01 04:00:00 EDT 1991

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/5578008· OSTI ID:5578008

The Alternative Motor Fuels Act of 1988 (Public Law 100-494), Section 400EE, states that the Secretary of Energy ...shall study methanol plants, including the costs and practicability of such plants that are (A) capable of utilizing current domestic supplies of unutilized natural gas; (B) relocatable; or (C) suitable for natural gas to methanol conversion by natural gas distribution companies...'' The purpose of this report is to characterize unutilized gas within the lower 48 states and to perform an economic analysis of methanol plants required by the act. The approach with regard to unutilized lower 48 gas is to (1) compare the costs of converting such gas to methanol against the expected price of gasoline over the next 20 years, and (2) compare the economics of converting such gas to methanol against the economics of using the gas as a pipeline-transported fuel. This study concludes that remote gas and low-Btu gas generally cannot be converted to methanol at costs near the expected competitive value of gasoline because of the poor economies of scale of small methanol plants.

• Research Organization: USDOE Office of Policy, Planning and Analysis, Washington, DC (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• OSTI ID: 5578008
• Report Number(s): DOE/PE-0098P; ON: DE91015451
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

03 NATURAL GAS
030400 -- Natural Gas-- Products & By-Products
10 SYNTHETIC FUELS
100200 -- Synthetic Fuels-- Production-- (1990-)
100700* -- Synthetic Fuels-- Economic
Industrial
& Business Aspects-- (1990-)
33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS
330800 -- Emission Control-- Alternative Fuels
ALCOHOLS
CARBON COMPOUNDS
CARBON DIOXIDE
CARBON OXIDES
CHALCOGENIDES
COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS
ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
ECONOMICS
ELEMENTS
ENERGY SOURCES
FLUIDS
FOSSIL FUELS
FUEL GAS
FUEL SUBSTITUTION
FUELS
GAS FUELS
GASES
HYDROGEN COMPOUNDS
HYDROGEN SULFIDES
HYDROXY COMPOUNDS
INDUSTRIAL PLANTS
METHANOL
METHANOL PLANTS
NATURAL GAS
NITROGEN
NONMETALS
ORGANIC COMPOUNDS
OXIDES
OXYGEN COMPOUNDS
PRICES
PRODUCTION
REMOVAL
SULFIDES
SULFUR COMPOUNDS
TRANSPORTATION SECTOR