Effects of natural gas vehicles and fuel prices on key transportation economic metrics.

Details

• Creators:
  Heaslip, Kevin ; Bosworth, Ryan ; Barnes, Ryan ; Sobh, Ali Soltani ; Thomas, Michael ; Song, Ziqi
• Corporate Creators:
  Utah Transportation Center
• Corporate Contributors:
  United States. Federal Highway Administration ; Mountain Plains Consortium
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  • Transportation planning
  • Long range planning
  • Natural gas vehicles
  • Fuel taxes
  • Travel demand
  • Vehicle miles of travel
  • Econometrics
  • Alternate fuels
  • Greenhouse gases
• Publication/ Report Number:
  WA-RD 829.1
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  Washington
• Corporate Publisher:
  Washington (State). Dept. of Transportation. Research Office
• Abstract:
  The Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) is responsible for planning, operating, and maintaining ; a highway network consisting of over 18,500 lane-miles of highway. Planning and building highways is, by nature, a ; long-range enterprise. It requires making many assumptions about future travel demand as well as estimating future ; fuel tax revenue. In recent years the growing uncertainty about oil prices and availability has made long-range ; transportation planning even more challenging. Rather than relying on trend extrapolation, this study uses market ; mechanisms to shed light on key long-range transportation planning assumptions. Although WSDOT is pursuing a ; variety of alternative fuels and energy sources including Electric Vehicles (EV), biofuels, propane, natural gas, etc. ; and their respective infrastructures, this study focuses primarily on natural gas. In particular, this study will help ; WSDOT assess the likelihood natural gas will substitute for petroleum fuels and estimate the impacts changes in fuel ; prices will have on travel demand, fuel consumption, Greenhouse Gas emissions, and fuel tax revenues. ; The results of the modeling show that the potential impacts of Natural Gas Vehicles (NGV) have the potential to have ; effects on vehicle miles traveled (VMT), emissions, and fuel tax revenue. The effects of these vehicles are muted by ; the current lack of natural gas vehicles in the fleet. The usage of natural gas vehicles is limited to fleet vehicles and ; vehicles with high mileage usage. Challenges with widespread integration currently include the increased upfront ; capital costs associated with vehicles with natural gas, decreased power for heavy vehicles, and range anxiety in ; locations without developed natural gas fueling infrastructure. Currently the NGV market in the state of Washington is ; hampered by these factors. The modeling and analysis provided in the document can be used to analyze changing ; conditions in the NGV market and the effects on key transportation metrics
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• Format:
  PDF
• Funding:
  GCB1168
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/27450/dot_27450_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 3.98 MB]
• Collection(s):
  University Transportation Centers ; US Transportation Collection
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha256:9af607aa2d9bf1156b776fdd709d816c94a6236f4e098c85efd8930c6790ac2f