Alternative Fuel Equals Clean Air for Indiana

On October 12, 2022, Homewood Disposal announced that it began using garbage trucks powered by Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) in the Valparaiso, Indiana area. Instead of filling their tanks with diesel fuel each morning, some of Homewood Disposal’s garbage trucks will be filling up with CNG fuel. CNG is an “alternative fuel”. Examples of other alternative fuels include electric, hydrogen, ethanol and propane.

This is good news for the air quality in Northwest Indiana and Porter County. CNG is a cleaner burning fuel than diesel and gasoline. Compared to diesel and gasoline, CNG is much better for air quality and produces less greenhouse gasses. According to Environmental Protection Agency, natural gas reduces carbon monoxide emissions 90 to 97 percent compared with gasoline. Using CNG reduces NOx emissions by 90% compared to diesel or gasoline.

Ozinga Energy developed the custom CNG fueling solution for Homewood Disposal. Ozinga Energy’s new mobile CNG compression solution has a smaller footprint than traditional CNG devices. This smaller footprint and mobile design, creates an entry level solution for businesses considering switching their fleet to CNG.  The Homewood fleet has been using CNG to fuel its garbage trucks in Gary, Indiana, Park Forest, Illinois and Homewood, Illinois since 2012.

Homewood Disposal also runs a public waste transfer station in Valparaiso, Indiana at 3101 Bertholet Blvd. Local residents and businesses can drop off large loads of waste material by the ton. Frequent customers at the waste transfer station are roofing companies, home building contractors, and cleaning companies. Homewood Disposal has been providing garbage service to Chicagoland and NW Indiana homes and businesses since 1956.

What is Drive Clean Indiana?

Drive Clean Indiana is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, that is Indiana’s only Department of Energy approved coalition. We support the nation’s energy and economic initiatives to advance cleaner transportation fuels. Our organization is proud to be carbon neutral and we strive to find a solution to pollution while reducing our nation’s dependence on foreign oil.

How is the use of CNG good for Indiana’s transportation industry?

CNG is a plays a vital role in decarbonizing Indiana’s transportation related emissions. Per a 2020 report from the EPA, transportation related emissions account for over 27% of the total amount of Greenhouse Gas Emissions. As the Crossroads of America, it is vital to have clean energy access for our goods movement across the state. As for the heavy duty recycling and refuse trucks, these trucks rely high powered, near zero Cummins (Hoosier Company) engines to move literal tons of MSW from our work, schools, daycare facilities and homes. Homewood Disposal Services has made the investment in CNG to reduce harmful emissions associated with diesel exhaust which creates for better quality of life for every community HDS serves.

Even more so, the HDS environmental commitment goes one step further with Renewable Natural Gas (RNG). The natural gas that is flowing through this station is sourced from a landfill. Instead of the methane leaching into the atmosphere, it captured and used as transportation fuel. RNG reduces greenhouse gas emittance by 83% when compared to new diesel trucks. Both RNG and CNG represent domestically sourced fuels that don’t rely on outside entities for production and supply chain issues, that cause volatility, as we see with diesel and gasoline. Even though CNG is cleaner burning fuel, CNG for retail sale is taxed the same as Diesel and Gasoline in our Hoosier state.

Can other companies use CNG fuel?
What are other examples of companies and industries that use CNG?

CNG can be used across class 1 to class 8 Gross Vehicle Weight Rating vehicles. In the area, many fleets have been running on CNG for many years now: U.S. Steel, Schwann’s, AT&T, Ozinga Ready Mix Trucks, to name a few. However, CNG has experienced the most success with the HD Refuse and Recycling Industry. CNG has also been a great fleet fuel for our local municipalities across the state, as in Muncie and South Bend. The City Hobart has 17 CNG vehicles in their fleet, has been piloting four CNG police cars in its fleet. That’s right, the City of Hobart has been running CNG in their police cars! In fact, we have a high concentration of CNG fleets in Region with Portage, Lake Station, Hobart, and Michigan City all running CNG! Additionally, we will be seeing more and more CNG deployments coming from Amazon semi haulers.