Is natural gas the same as propane?

Question

ive always been hearing that you could fuel your cars or heat your homes with natural gas and what not, im just wondering, is natural gas like methane that come from land fills or is it the same thing as propane?

Btw, wouldnt it cost more to fuel your car with propane then regular gasoline? i mean im not sure how fast your engine would burn up the propane but i think it would cost more and be more agravating

Answer 1

No, they are not the same thing! I have 2 cars that run on natural gas but they wouldn't on propane. Not the same stuff, not the same power and not the same price! Propane is more costly and you'd get fewer mpg out of it. Check my sources below to see if there is a filling station near you that has natural gas.

Answer 2

The basic equipment used to burn natural gas or propane on vehicles is fairly similar, other than the fuel tanks. Natural gas tanks add a lot more weight to the vehicle than propane does. This is because NG is stored as a vapour and the only way to get any kind of capacity is to compress the stuff to very high pressures. The tanks are much thicker than a LP tank and therefore heavier. Driving range of NG is typically a little shorter than LP because of the storage issues.

In vehicles prior to the mid nineties the conversion technology we were using was basically unchanged for close to 40 years. Impco teechnologies made most of the mixers and converters for over the road applications and on vehicles with distributer ignition systems and gasoline carburetors we could convert a vehicle fairly easily and economically. In the earlier nineties it only took about 50,000 km's for the conversion cost to pay for itself. In todays world of computer controlled everything, converting newer vehicles to alternate fuels is much more complicated.

Prins Fuels and Impco are probably two of the better systems out there today. I am out of touch with the vehicle conversion business now, but I'm pretty sure the cost of conversions is now somewhere in the $5,000 to $6,000 range. You've got to drive a lot of km's for the cost of conversion to pay for itself! As far as driveability, if the conversion is done properly you won't notice whether you are running on gasoline or alternate fuel. A lot of people complain about loss of power on LP, but if it's done properly, with the proper electronic fixes installed, distributers recurved (on older vehicles) it's minimal...

You will definitely save money on a per litre basis for your fuel, but it's the initial cost that you need to factor in. If you go to www.prins-lpg.com they have a distributor locator that I'm sure could help you find a conversion dealer in your area.

Hope this helps!

Answer 3

Natural gas is mix of many "natural' gases.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_gas

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Propane is chemically pure gas

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_gas

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>> Btw, wouldnt it cost more to fuel your car with propane then regular gasoline?

The cost of many things (including fuel) is mostly determined by supply and demand. And currently there's plenty of supply.

Good Luck....

Answer 4

Propane is derived from other petroleum products during oil or natural gas processing. It is commonly used as a fuel for engines, barbecues, and home heating systems.

When sold as fuel, it is commonly known as liquified petroleum gas (LPG or LP-gas), which can be a mixture of propane along with small amounts of propylene, butane, and butylene. The odorant ethanethiol is also added so that people can easily smell the gas in case of a leak.

Butane gas, on the otherhand, is sold bottled as a fuel for cooking and camping. When blended with propane and other hydrocarbons, it is referred to commercially as LPG. It is also used as a petrol component, as a feedstock for the production of base petrochemicals in steam cracking, as fuel for cigarette lighters and as a propellant in aerosol sprays such as deodorants.

Very pure forms of butane, especially isobutane, can be used as refrigerants and have largely replaced the ozone layer depleting halomethanes, for instance in household refrigerators and freezers. The flammability of butane is not a major issue because the amount of butane in an appliance is not enough to cause a combustible mix given the amount of air in a room. The system operating pressure for butane is lower than for the halomethanes, such as R-12, so R-12 systems such as in automotive air conditioning systems, when converted to butane will not function optimally.

Answer 5

Hey i work in the oil and gas field and you should even try it on a car. Propane comes from natural gas along with things like butane, propane , etc. It goes through a stripping plant and they take the different things out of it. Propane burns a lot hotter then gasoline to but if your looking for  a car that is made for running gasoline or a flex fuel try looking into Ford cars they have flex fuel cars. Natural gas comes in a gas form to not a liquid form. Gasoline is made out of crude oil and so isnt diesel and grease and what not well hope this helps you out.

Answer 6

the gases are of different property. either can be a fuel for an engine. the pressure control device will be different. propane is used at a pressure of 7 to 9 psi when natural is used at 3 in. water column natural can be a liquid(cng) same as propane