With an aim to disrupt the heavy-duty trucking industry, Blue Energy Motors (BEM) has launched India’s first Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) fueled green truck manufacturing plant at Chakan, Pune. The facility was inaugurated by Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways.
The company has already signed an agreement with FPT Industrial, the global powertrain brand of Iveco Group headquartered in Italy, to introduce the first LNG trucks powered by FPT Industrial engines which are BSVI compliant.
The market entry of the LNG-fueled trucks will start with introduction of 5528 4x2 tractor as the first model.
Blue Energy Motors trucks have been designed & tested in accordance with demanding Indian transport industry’s duty cycles. These trucks are powered by FPT Industrial engine that generates high torque. The FPT Industrial engine is one the most powerful natural gas engine in the market and is compatible with CNG, LNG and biomethane; it uses multipoint stoichiometric combustion to assure best-in-class fuel consumption and lower noise than diesel engines.
Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways, said, “This is the fuel for the future. It's cost-effective and a changemaker for the transport sector. It is a great alternative to petrol and diesel at a time when we import so much. With LNG, there will be savings and we will reduce our logistics cost by 16 per cent, and further bring it down to 10 per cent, which is our target. We are making LNG and CNG from biomass in Maharashtra, Punjab and Haryana. Within 2 years we will have more than 200 capacities in the country.”