• 16 Feb 2017

Omnitek Engineering Corp. has announced that, alongside its partner, Olson-Ecologic Testing Laboratories, it will take part in a US$1.5 million Grant study offered by California Energy Commission (CEC), to demonstrate its clean natural gas engine technology for off-road heavy-duty construction vehicle applications in the greater Los Angeles area, California, US.

The company will develop an 18 litre Caterpillar natural gas engine, which will be capable of running on low-carbon intensive renewable biogas (R-CNG), CNG, or LNG. In order to do this, it will use its patented diesel-to-natural gas engine conversion technology.

Olson-Ecologic Engine Testing Laboratories will act as the project manager, and will carry out thorough testing at its facility before demonstrations under real-life conditions.

The President and CEO of Omnitek Engineering Corp., Werner Funk, said: “Construction equipment is the largest category of off-road emissions in the South Coast Air Basin, accounting for about one third of the off-road NOx and PM 2.5 emissions, according information provided by the California Air Resources Board (CARB). Our goal is to demonstrate the cost-effective alternatives to reduce carbon emissions, improve air quality, and facilitate fleet compliance requirements by introducing advanced technology natural gas engines to the traditionally diesel powered off-road construction industry.”

Funk added that heavy-duty diesel off-road machinery has a long service life and therefore is replaced less frequently than on-road heavy duty trucks. The long service life of heavy-duty off-road machinery results in a very slow rotation of the fleet to cleaner technology. “We are advocating a cost-effective repower of existing older machines with Tier 4 compliant NG engines instead of replacing vehicles by purchasing new Tier 4 compliant diesel machines. Such engine repower is especially cost-effective when it is performed during a scheduled engine overhaul, or major engine refurbishing.”