Gas - a bridging technology for future mobility?

摘要

Great progress has been made in the exploration and production of natural gas in recent years. Reserves of conventional gas are plentiful, and large resources of unconventional gas have been added. At the same time, there is still a lot of pressure for climate action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Natural gas is the lowest-carbon fossil fuel. Almost all medium- to long-term energy scenarios foresee a substantial increase in global consumption of natural gas. It can be used to generate both power and heat. But so far gaseous fuels have had only a niche position as an option for the transport sector. Increased discussion of gas, in particular natural gas, as a future transport fuel started just recently. The following article starts by considering the development of supply and current expectations for availability of natural gas. It discusses the various types of gas, in particular conventional and unconventional, and technical methods both standard and new for gas production. It also deals with natural gas demand scenarios and future markets, including the value chain for natural gas fuels. The article covers in particular the use of gaseous and gas-based fuels in the transport sector. It examines various production paths for natural gas fuels for transport, and also the fuels as such (CNG, LNG, GTL); it compares the product characteristics of natural gas fuels with those of conventional fuels (gasoline/diesel fuel) and other gaseous fuels (in particular LPG and hydrogen). It discusses the application possibilities of gas fuels in the various transport sectors. It considers the use of gas fuels in internal combustion engines in different transport sectors with different combustion processes, including consideration of their energy efficiency (consumption/performance) and their ecological performance (air pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions). Finally, it addresses the question of what and under what conditions natural gas fuels can contribute to an "energy transition" in the transport sector.