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New Jersey’s dual-fuel cars filling up with petrol, not propane, reports state audit
The Associated Press
Most of the nearly 1,700 cars in the state of New Jersey’s motor pool that can also run on natural gas are often being filled with gasoline, and more than half have never been filled with the cleaner-burning natural gas, according to a state audit.
The audit also said another 250 of the vehicles had seen less than 10 gallons of the compressed natural gas fuel over their lifetimes.
A New Jersey Treasury spokesman blamed a lack of stations where the vehicles could be filled with gas as a reason for reliance on gasoline.
Over the past seven years, New Jersey has spent $9 million to buy the vehicles, which cost about $5,000 more than regular gasoline-fueled cars. As of 2002, the state had purchased 1,692 of the vehicles.
Most of the cars were bought under a 1992 federal law requiring states to make 10 percent of their vehicle purchases advanced-technology, low-polluting cars by 1997, and 75 percent by model year 2001.
The review by the Office of the New Jersey State Auditor covered September 2000 to December 2002, overlapping the administrations of Gov. James E. McGreevey and former Gov. Christie Whitman, who signed an executive order in 1999 requiring the state to exceed the federal mandate’s provisions. Environmental benefit not received “The state has incurred significant incremental costs without receiving a corresponding environmental benefit,” according to the audit, which was released last summer with little fanfare.
An audit two years ago came to much of the same conclusion. “The state has not resolved the significant conditions noted in our prior report,” the current review noted.
McGreevey administration officials said that last year 10 percent of the vehicles had been powered by natural gas. And the audit did note the state has made more use of natural gas: As of November 2002, 56 percent of the vehicles had never been filled with natural gas, compared with 73 percent in 2000.
Treasury spokesman Tom Vincz said the vehicles have been mainly fueled with gasoline because there are only three state-run natural gas filling stations. Twenty-one other such stations in the state are run by utilities and other agencies required to use the cars.
The situation in New Jersey is also playing out in other states, according to Tom Ostrye of the Houston-based Hanover Co., a producer of natural gas stations.
“They buy the vehicles, then nobody wants to fool with them. There are some states that are better than others,” Ostrye told The Star-Ledger of Newark.
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