In a bid to mitigate against soaring petrol and diesel prices and reduce its carbon footprint, facilities management company Servest is planning to convert 70 of its over 700 national fleet vehicles to be fuelled by compressed natural gas (CNG). The first vehicles operating with dual fuel are already in the field, and the positive results have built confidence with the company’s drivers, their operational teams and more importantly, its customers.
Servest, which celebrates 25 years in business this year, expects to see a return on this investment of about nine months’ worth of fuel savings. More importantly, customers have also expressed an interest in finding out more about this initiative as they welcome the benefits of a reduced carbon footprint from their supplier base.
According to Servest co-founder and CEO Dennis Zietsman, the group’s offering is founded on innovative solutions thinking.
“Despite the abundance of natural gas in the sub-Saharan region, the use of compressed natural gas in motor vehicles is still very low compared with the global average,” Zietsman says. “Our aim is to explore best solutions to minimise our carbon impact and in turn save on the high cost of fuel.”
According to the latest research, Africa is trailing well behind every other region globally regarding the uptake of natural gas as an alternative to liquid fuels such as diesel and petrol. Asia-Pacific has 19 841 688 natural gas vehicles (NGV), followed by Europe with 2 013 693, North America with 224 500, and Latin America with 5 417 146. Africa has only 268 349 NGVs.
Ambesikhaya Ngobo, Servest’s Technical Category Manager, says, “This technology has several other benefits – CNG is a clean fuel that produces significantly less greenhouse emissions than liquid fuels, so it is environmentally friendly, and as it is a cleaner burning fuel it will also support reduced maintenance of the vehicles.”
In addition to the pricing stability of local CNG, which is not influenced by volatile geo-political events outside the region, Ngobo says cost savings for using CNG are very compelling. Natural gas prices have also increased over the past six months but cannot be compared with petrol and diesel, which have seen prices soar to record highs during the comparable period.
Ngobo explains that the limited footprint of CNG refuelling stations across the country is a factor in limiting the uptake of CNG. Servest has therefore opted for dual fuel that provides the flexibility to utilise mainly CNG but to automatically default to fossil fuel when CNG is not available.
Servest has partnered with Vehicle Gas Solutions and Bosch on the vehicle conversions and will in future consider partnering with NG suppliers on the establishment of additional NG fuel stations in areas where it has high vehicle utilisation.
The move away from liquid fuels to cleaner energies (electrical, hydrogen) for the mobility market is a global trend driven by the need to reduce greenhouse gases. These efforts have been accelerated by recent global events and their impact on fuel costs. This, together with local regional developments in the supply of off-shore and on-shore Natural Gas (both liquified and compressed), means that NG must be part of the energy mix for Servest and by implication Servest’s customers as well.
