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CNG truck supply shows up on Shreveport dealer lots

Kate Archer Kent

A Shreveport car dealership is now stocking a Dodge Ram Hemi crew-cab truck that runs on compressed natural gas or CNG. It’s the first truck in the United States that comes with a factory-made CNG option, an $11,000 add-on.

Hebert's Town and Country manager Beau Hebert has three of these trucks on his lot, and he’s ordered 10 more. With 11 fueling stations now in Louisiana, he’s betting on a much higher demand for CNG, especially among people who haul stuff as part of their job.

"The neat thing about this truck is it actually has two gas gauges, one for gas and one for CNG," Hebert said. "The CNG tank holds the equivalent to 18.5 gallons of gas, you could say."

Between the two tanks, it cost Hebert $28 dollars to fill up the truck. He said it will run for 367 miles on the combined tanks. Chesapeake Energy spokeswoman Katie McCullin said the truck is a breakthrough in the CNG consumer market.

"A lot of peeps often ask about the chicken or the egg, well now it's happening at the same time," McCullin said. "Fueling infrastructure is becoming more available, and then you have vehicles like this that run on traditional gasoline and CNG."

A new report by a Colorado research firm that specializes in alternative energy, Pike Research, suggests that nearly 1 million natural gas trucks and buses will be sold worldwide over a seven-year span ending in 2019.

Another Shreveport dealership, Landers Dodge, also has taken shipment of the CNG trucks.