The news item does not say but I assume the bus was powered by compressed natural gas.
I have some reservations about using natural gas, petorleum gas, or hydrogen for powering vehicles whether they be buses, cars, or locomotives. Liquid fuels are more stable in that their physical handling characteristics are easier to control for safety sake. Gas fuels are more prone to leakage because they are typically under pressurization, and that’s where they get us into trouble.
That may be one reason BNSF suspended it’s natural gas powered locomotive experiments - yeah, they may be more efficient fuel wise, but the handling characteristics leave something to be desired.
Now they greenies are trying to push hydrogen as a basic fuel. Yet another volatile gas just waiting to explode!
No thanks. Just give us coal in some safe to handle form, and we’ll all be better off for it.
most of the mobile hydrogen storage systems now being researched store the hydrogen as a metal hydride - not a compressed gas. Hydrogen is rather hard to store as a compressed gas because the molecule is so small that steel is porous to hydrogen. If you see a tube truck on the road carrying hydrogen, the light weight is almost the same as the loaded weight. I have never seen a tube car on the railroad for hydrogen but I am certain the same relationship applies - lots of steel, little hydrogen. Metal hydrides can actually store more hydrogen per cubic foot than compressed hydrogen.
This not a new thing, it has been known for a long time that Natural Gas powered vehicles are VERY succeptible to fires like this. A family member of mine works for a company that uses Natural Gas vehicles, and I heard a story about a vehicle burning down with less than 100 miles on it, spreading to an identicle vehicle parked next to it! It happens, they are developing technology to prevent this. Getting close too.
Andrew is right, busses burn all the time no matter what they run on. If you have a transit company in your area just drive by thier mantainance yard and look at the junk yard with all the buses that burned.
Compressed gases are not unsafe. You just have to fix the fuel leaks like any piece of equipment or vehicle. Their is alot of small construction equipment that runs on propane just like the grill you may have, if it was unsafe no one would use it. Alot of vehicle fires are caused by electrical problems and fuel leak(s).
Also, if you have an engine that runs on diesel or gasoline and convert it to run on propane or natural gas it will have less horsepower, you have to derate the horsepower because natural gas has less heat energy than gasoline and diesel fuel. Mabey thats why the railroads don’t use it?
