CNG In A Box takes natural gas from a pipeline and compresses it on-site at an industrial location or at a traditional automotive refilling station to then turn it into CNG. A CNG vehicle, such as a taxi, bus or small truck, can then refill its tank using a traditional fuel dispenser, much like those used for diesel or gasoline refueling.

Key features include:

• The gas compression, storage, cooling, drying and controls are easy to ship and maintain due to its compact “In Box” design.

• The units come in two configurations: an 8 foot x 20 foot container or 8 foot x 40 foot container, depending on the site’s need.

• Its modular and intuitive design makes it “Plug & Play” on-site.

• The offering includes GE Wayne branded dispensers with credit card capability and provision for “Point Of Sale” interface.

• The fuel dispenses at a rate of about 7 gasoline gallon equivalent per minute.

This CNG technology will be brought to market by Peake Fuel Solutions—a Chesapeake affiliate—which has experience with natural gas vehicles, vehicle emission controls and natural gas market dynamics. Chesapeake also brings considerable in-house expertise in CNG market development to the GE collaboration, including retail station relationships, fleet outreach and education programs and policy engagement.

A vehicle using CNG can reduce annual fuel costs up to 40 percent, assuming 25,700 miles per year driven, gasoline priced at $3.50/gallon and CNG at $2.09/gasoline gallon equivalent. This represents savings totaling as much as $1,500 per fleet vehicle per year. In total, for each fleet vehicle using fuel provided by CNG In A Box instead of gasoline, a fleet operator can reduce CO₂e emissions from fuel combustion by about 24%, or 2.2 metric tons per vehicle annually, assuming an average fleet vehicle travels approximately 25,700 miles per year.

Other elements of the new collaboration include:

• Aftermarket services for natural gas fueling infrastructure.

• GE’s LNG fueling plants, which adapt GE’s proven large-scale LNG liquefaction technologies to smaller-scale operations. Using LNG as a substitute for diesel or fuel oil can reduce combustion emissions up to 25%.

• Development of home refueling technologies.

• Co-marketing of products and services resulting from the partnership.

The collaboration is designed to leverage GE’s global Oil & Gas technology portfolio with Chesapeake’s expertise in developing fueling solutions to lower the ownership and operational costs of natural gas vehicle (NGV) fueling stations. With the development of shale resources significantly increasing the amount of low-cost natural gas in North America, GE and Chesapeake believe that their collaboration can help incentivize operators to put more NGVs on US highways.