PTT promising more NGV

ENERGY / ALTERNATIVE FUELS

PTT promising more NGV

SANTAN SANTIVIMOLNAT

PTT Plc, the only supplier of natural gas for vehicles (NGV), has assured motorists that NGV shortages will be eased by the middle of next year.

The majority state-owned oil and gas conglomerate also confirmed that the NGV price would be pegged at 8.50 baht per kilogramme until the end of 2008.

Chitrapongse Kwangsuksathit, senior executive vice-president, said the NGV shortage would gradually ease and problems would be resolved by next July. The capacity of NGV feeder stations would be boosted above demand. By then, NGV supply at small stations would reach 2,300 tons per day while demand is expected to rise to 1,650 tons per day.

Demand for NGV has increased significantly since the government started encouraging motorists to switch to NGV in place of more expensive petrol and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).

Currently, there are about 54,000 NGV vehicles, but only 166 NGV refuelling stations countrywide. An additional 32 refuelling stations have been completed and will be ready for service soon.

Mr Chitrapongse said the NGV shortage was caused by too few NGV trucks to deliver the gas from feeder stations to small stations. After the trucking problem was solved, the number of vehicles running on NGV rose rapidly until the number of service stations was insufficient to serve vehicles. NGV demand has tripled to 980 tons per day at present from 300 tons per day in 2006.

Feeder stations, which are rarely located along natural gas pipelines, must provide NGV filling services to motorists while also delivering NGV to smaller stations. This meant that there were not enough service stations to supply the rising number of NGV-powered vehicles.

To solve the problem, PTT increased the capacity of feeder stations while bringing their number to seven. Five stations are in Bangkok and one each in Kamphaeng Phet and Songkhla. This would increase to 16 stations in 2008 to deliver 3,190 tons per day of NGV to smaller stations, said Mr Chitrapongse.

PTT also announced that it would stop subsidising NGV equipment installations at the end of this year.

It now offers a 10,000-baht discount for cash payments and zero interest for credit to install the NGV equipment.