Mercedes-Benz to enter U.S. CNG market with a natural gas B-Class?
Click above for high-res gallery of the BiFuel B170
Compressed natural gas may not be given the publicity it deserves. After all, it burns cleaner than other fossil fuels, it can be collected from landfills and waste facilities and it's abundant in North America. Regardless, CNG doesn't seem to get much support from the government as an alternative to gasoline or diesel; certainly much less so than hybrids or fully electric vehicles. This lack of government help for the fuel makes it much less attractive to consumers than other alternatives.
Mercedes-Benz is still interested in testing the American CNG waters, though, and the German automaker is proving it's serious by bringing a natural gas-powered version of its B-Class compact MPV - the BiFuel B170 NGT -to the Auto Show that's currently taking place in Washington D.C. A CNG-powered B-Class is already available in Europe (and South America), where natural gas, sometimes referred to as autogas, is a more popular choice than it is in the United States.
Gallery: Mercedes BiFuel B-Class B170
[Source: Automotive News - Sub. Req.]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
asus 12:42PM (2/04/2009)
How about just a C220 bluetec? 295 lb-ft of torque running through a 6-speed manual gearbox. 40 mpg. Seems like a decent place to start?
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jharlan 12:53PM (2/04/2009)
We are spoiled here. We don't have to travel a bunch of extra miles or spend a lot of extra time looking for a place to refuel. CNG is good, but until the infrastructure is in place, it's a pain in the *ss. LPG already has the infrastructure pretty well in place. No sale!
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Rain 1:00PM (2/04/2009)
I would love one of these but would also need the home fuel station,the nearest fueling station for CNG is thirty miles from My house.
At .80 cents a gallon though it would probably be worth it.
I'm hoping the VW Bluetech Roadster makes it to production,a C220 sounds nice but that VW/Porshe is hot!
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gorr 1:55PM (2/04/2009)
Natural gas is not in use in u.s.a, japan, canada and many other places because republicans with banks wanted to monopolyse crude oil tradings to finance and start a general war on earth, between jews and arabs mainly so they impeded petrol alternatives with the help of gm, ford, chrsler, toyota, tesla, etc. Hydrogen make them sick. They always say that they must import oil from terrorists country and this is just to justify a war because it's full of natural gas in north-america to power cars, trucks, ships, electrical generation, agricol machineries, motorcycles, motocross, lawn mower, nascar, indy racing league, jet-skis, snowmobiles, fish boats, bus, tractor trailors, etc. Even natural gas supply is controled in u.s.a , canada, germany, japan, etc by these same folks. Communism have been set-up when gm agreed to that in the fifties era and early on too.
For this car, im interrested to buy if we can put hydrogen gas too in this tank. It's easy and don't make the car more costly. The only modification will be to add a detector that will put ignition timing to top dead center when hydrogen gas is used because it explode instantly contrary to fossil fuel that burn slowly. A mist of water put in the cylinder when hydrogen gas is running add expanding forces to increase h.p by 50%. some places in u.s.a are develloping hydrogen fueling stations. You cannot put a mist of water in gasoline or natural gas operation because water impede fossil fuel burning but you can add it with hydrogen operation because it don't impede the burning of it, see the H.A.W website where they still studying it from 3 years ago with no commercialisation at all even if it work tremendously good without too much cost and with any pollution and since then there been 400 billions or more of petrol trading and burning since the last 3 years. The japanese goverment is impeding it by doing endless studies about it. Not surprisinly there is no hydrogen cars on sale in canada where i live and breath the f*cking air.
http://www.minotdailynews.com/page/content.detail/id/523765.html?nav=5010&showlayout=0
http://www.kxmb.com/News/325967.asp
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ale 6:00PM (2/04/2009)
while I dont do much for government whacking, cuz i feel its a waste of time, but there is truth in the Hydrogen thing, since CNG vehicles run high pressured injectors, a CNG fueled car requires less modification to run on Hydrogen fuel. That being said, Cummins has outfitted diesel engines with the ability to run CNG, (considering the pressure needed to run CNG is almost similar to that of a diesel, and that most diesel blocks.. i.e. real diesel blocks (whether new or old), could run on it with much less modification and less pricier than for a traditional gas car. So maybe one day, that Blue TDI roadster will be able to run on diesel and then later hydrogen... of course "hydrogen injection" is a completely different story :)
david burgdorff 3:46PM (2/04/2009)
Despite the fact that natural gas is half the price of oil, we get little interest from the media for CNG cars. Environmentalists insist on pushing expensive electric cars by demanding huge tax credits. As far as infrastructure is concerned, all one needs for a CNG car is a compressor installed in the garage. These cars shouldn't cost more than an ICE car and don't need a huge tax credit, perhaps some help with the cost of the compressor.
In the time it takes to get a million electric cars on the road we could have many millions of CNG out there giving us a much greater reduction of foreign oil and a much greater improvement in environment and national security.
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ReneS 6:37PM (2/04/2009)
Just as hint. Autogas is something different.
Autogas = LPG = Liquefied Petroleum Gas
CNG = Compressed Natural Gas
LNG = Liquefied Natural Gas
Autogas contains propane and butane and is heavier than air, while CNG is lighter than air. CNG is mainly methane.
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