[toolpush]

Well Scrubbie and Tanada,

Thanks for the links, I must admit I had never heard of anyone using Propane in a compression ignition engine. It appears from both the links that these marketers are mainly focused in the smaller end of the diesel market, though they do say they can do larger engines.
Though in my defense, I believe this is a very small niche market compared to the Nat gas/ diesel compression ignition market. Where Westport has tie ups with companies such as Cummins, Cat, Volvo plus other undisclosed OEMs. This is for High pressure nat gas injected engines. There are also plenty of low pressure nat gas injection systems also available being used in the heavy truck market, both in Australia and America.

Sea Gyspy,

I don't know what you are on about with LPG, I am agreeing with you. But don't call me BS, and say I don't know what I am talking about, just because your head is off in another world.
Anyway, you don't seem interested in a sensible conversation, just your own agenda, so good to you!

[SeaGypsy]

Excuse me for reading you wrong Tool, but it appeared to me here is a newbie doing a link dump & pushing the LPG pixie dust barrow for Australia? I currently work over 70 hours a week outdoors in Darwin area. I have hung around here a bit. There is not a Unicorn variety or crossbreed we have not had deep discussion on, in this board. I don't have time or feel inclined to a massive revision which I know will lead down the same neck of the woods, as a search here for LPG or NG will show. I'm up for updates on NG for reasons already stated, but GTL is only slightly removed from CTL & all that wizardry without an end game just makes me miserable & bored, both of which states have absorbed enough of my life already. As Scrubby says,
Cheers

[SeaGypsy]

Tool, I just checked to jog my memory, there are over 200 posts on this forum mentioning LPG & diesel, a good chunk of which are about the set up Tanada describes above. Its nifty, not a game changer, never will be. Tanada is big on game change & knows like most of us here that tinkering the fossil mix for efficiency etc leads to places of infamy in the long run. At best they are all just stop gap technologies, not long term solutions.

[toolpush]

SeaGypsy.

I still don't understand where you are coming from. I started off agreeing LPG was on the down hill run is Oz, but commented that Woodside was exporting LPG, and mentioned LNG in truck use in Australia. Which are correct statements.

You claimed in a side swipe, that I didn't know what I was talking about. That's what got me pissed off???? And for some reason you still think I pushing LPG? In that comment you showed your ignorance that Woodside exported LPG. And you started claiming that Nat gas required a long stroke engine. Which I am still waiting for an explanation as to why.
Now you are are branching off into CTL and GTL, you forgot UCG, and how about XTL for a laugh. You have pre-judged my position assuming what I must be thinking. Please don't just read what I write.
You may have been around here for awhile, but I don't think that gives you the right to be rude and arrogant and jump to conclusions just because you are too tide up up in your own agenda. I too was working a 12hr day yesterday, in and out of the office, and what was suppose to be a short little comment a thread turned into a marathon.
If you are still reading, and interested in my opinion, Nat gas can have an impact on oil use, but it is not going to be in a 5+l/100 Mazada 3, but at the other end of the spectrum. Environment as well oil cost have the shipping industry building ships with Nat Gas/diesel engines. It is mainly starting in the ferry market, but Maersk have built their latest container ships ready to convert once more infrastructure is in place. Stationary power generation, as in the power for land based drilling rigs are using a combination of LNG or CNG. The North American rail companies have all bought prototypes of LNG powered engines, and the US trucking industry has started using CNG and some LNG.
So that is my opinion, which doesn't count for much as everyone has one.
good night

[SeaGypsy]

Quote: "if Woodside stripped out all the LPG... We would have more than we could ever need"... I call that bullshit & you get all sensitive. Jeez man.

[Scrub Puller]

Yair . . .
I can't quite follow what is going on in the toolpush/SeaGypsy bun fight but I seem to recall that down on the Moony Gas field they had little four cylinder Waukesha engines running with just a regulator between the manifold and a four inch gasline . . . they were common as and nothing very special.

Cheers.

[basil_hayden]

So to recap, plenty of LNG propane in Oz, just no motors that run it.

[SeaGypsy]

LNG Propane, there we go. We have about 1 million vehicles fitted for LPG & about none for CNG. LPG is not cheap & the days of it beating petrol significantly on cost per distance are mostly over unless you live next to one of 2 remaining refineries. NG on the other hand we do have more than we know what to do with.

[Smurfs1976]

That turned into a bigger discussion than I'd expected.

Reason for posting is that this is something I've been expecting for a while given the narrowing price differential versus petrol and also the decline (and imminent complete shutdown) of Australian car manufacturing. Without those two factors, LPG doesn't seem to have much going for it.

I just wasn't expecting to see the pumps actually being taken out of smaller towns quite so soon. At some point yes, but I thought maybe that wouldn't be until sometime after 2020. I guess the sales volume must be falling faster than I'd assumed.

As for NG for vehicles in Australia, that always seems to be "just around the corner". A lot of buses in Adelaide went to CNG but the new ones seem to be diesel once again. Here in Hobart, the City Council has a few small trucks used for road maintenance etc running on CNG but that's easy given they don't travel far outside the city anyway. The only car I've ever seen running on it belongs to the gas company, though even they are still running most of their vehicles on petrol or diesel.

[SeaGypsy]

Its not about lack of internal customers, it is about LPG being a very solid market in its own right, primarily as cooking fuel to the 2-4 billion who no t long ago were burning damp sticks & cow dung. The markel is huge, its a real high value commodity which once refined & condensed is not difficult to ship.

[toolpush]

Scrub Puller,

Do you realize that a new LNG plant opened in Chinchilla earlier this month for road transport?
http://www.utilitymagazine.com.au/micro ... hinchilla/

A dedicated micro‐LNG plant near the Queensland township of Chinchilla has been officially opened by Queensland Premier, Campbell Newman, who used the opportunity to also launch a new Queensland Fuels and Energy strategy.

BOC, a member of The Linde Group, has entered into a long‐term gas supply agreement with QGC, enabling them to produce LNG for a range of domestic fuel uses in the manufacturing, mining, and long‐haul trucking markets.

That is just down the road from you I believe.

[SeaGypsy]

They just shipped out their first full scale load of LNG from QLD.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-12-30/first-shipment-of-lng-to-leave-gladstone-bound-for-asia/5992840

[Scrub Puller]

Yair . . . Yep, the boom/bust cycle in Gladstone maybe not bust but it's in pretty steep decline.

The major works are completed on the gas trains and pipelines and thousands of jobs are gone.

I see major "workers villages" being dismantled and loaded onto trucks . . . it is going to be interesting to see how long they can keep those two pipes flowing from the coal seams.

Lots of pub talk about wells playing out faster than expected.

Cheers.

[toolpush]

Fellas,

if you are replying to me, I am not talking about Gladstone. I am talking about Chinchilla. It is a small plant designed for heavy road transport and stationary power production. Just like the plant at Dandenong in Victoria.

[SeaGypsy]

Let's see how it pans out, good luck to them. I'm guessing though the take up will be pretty restricted until long distance heavy haulers can rely on getting the juice across the primary network at least.