The National Conference on Weights and Measures (NCWM) announced in March that it would vote on the diesel gallon equivalent (DGE) proposal at its annual meeting in July. The votes are now in: The measure, which holds much prevalence in the natural gas vehicle sector, was not approved.
According to an NGVAmerica forum, NCWM's House of State Representatives and House of Delegates both had to approve the measure. The votes came out to 29 in favor and nine against for the State Representatives, but the measure was shot down for the Delegates with only 14 in favor and 27 against at the Detroit conference.
At issue is how compressed natural gas (CNG) and liquefied natural gas (LNG) are measured when being used as transportation fuels: mass (e.g., pounds or kilograms) versus volume (e.g., gallons). A DGE would equate to 6.38 pounds of CNG or 6.06 pounds of LNG, the committee has said.
Because the measure was not approved, the gasoline gallon equivalent (GGE) unit of CNG stays as it is, and operators cannot sell CNG in DGE.
‘The adoption of uniform standards is important so that equipment manufacturers only have to meet one set of design requirements and retailers understand how to offer the product for sale in a way that allows consumers to compare prices,’ the NCWM said back in March.
NGVAmerica says the proposal will not be dropped, however, and will likely be reviewed again.
Read the full NGVAmerica report here.
