- "We must reinforce the infrastructure and assume the challenge among all of us to install 300 gas stations in Spain until 2020”, the President of SEAT emphasised
- When refuelling, Compressed Natural Gas results in a cost savings of 55% compared to petrol and 30% compared to diesel
SEAT has positioned itself as the brand of reference in the Volkswagen Group’s Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) strategy. In this sense, the President of SEAT announced that the SEAT Technical Centre, which employs more than 1,000 engineers, is going to develop CNG technology for the Volkswagen Group, making it a Technology Centre on an international level. “We want this to be technology made in Spain, we want to be pioneers and are confident we are going to achieve it”, he said.
Speaking before the highest representatives of the gas industry, Luca de Meo underlined that the dual ECO advantage of these vehicles is that they are ECOlogical as well as ECOnomical, as the Earth has enough gas reserves to last hundreds of years.
He also indicated that if Spain’s vehicle fleet had a million light CNG cars, 1.2 tonnes of CO2/year would not be released to the atmosphere, or the equivalent of covering Madrid with trees. “Besides, each driver would benefit from a savings of between 700 and 1,000 euros every year.”
“These cars, vans or trucks require no further technological development, they’re reliable, safe, extraordinarily cost competitive, comfortable and very practical. They have a farther range than other options and their use adapts better to the surroundings than other technologies, either for city driving or medium or long distance commutes”, he underlined.
Regarding the collaboration among entities to develop this technology, the President of SEAT also underscored that the future of CNG involves “the cooperation of competitors, institutions and other companies in order to create an ecosystem and manage to make CNG an alternative to electrification.”
“It is vital that we step up investments in gas stations, because it’s no use having the technology and the market without the proper infrastructure to respond to customer needs”, de Meo claimed. Furthermore, he also pointed out that SEAT is working with several partners assuming the challenge of making 300 gas stations available in Spain by the year 2020.
SEAT began its commitment to CNG with the launch of the Mii, the Leon TGI and the Ibiza, with the aim of “becoming the benchmark brand in vehicular mobility with natural gas, biogas and future synthetic fuels”.In fact, SEAT has Europe’s and the Volkswagen Group’s broadest portfolio of CNG cars. By the end of 2018, SEAT is also going to adapt the Arona, the world’s only CNG SUV.
In Spain, registrations of vehicles fuelled with Compressed Natural Gas have gone up 10 times so far this year, and by 2030 it can be expected that a million gas-powered cars will be seen on Spanish roads and in cities. For SEAT, “the Spanish market is the second largest in terms of CNG technology, after Italy”, as shown by the fact that, in the first quarter of 2018, SEAT sold more than 900 gas-powered cars in Spain, nearly as many as in all of 2017.