A natural gas production plant planned for North Jacksonville will be the first of more than 10 across the country built by Clean Energy Fuels Corp. in partnership with General Electric.
"This is the beginning of the tsunami. We've really worked to make a market for this," said David Mizerowski Clean Energy regional sales manager.
Clean Energy, a company backed by Texas billionaire T. Boone Pickens, and its partners invested $400 million over the last three years to build a network of liquefied natural gas (LNG) fueling stations from coast to coast in support of long-haul fleets that convert to natural gas. Those stations have just begun to come online.
The new liquefaction plant, like the one planned for 1632 Zoo Parkway in North Jacksonville, will service those fueling stations, Mizerowski said.
Clean Energy, through a partnership with GE and Ferus Natural Gas, picked Jacksonville as the first location to build such a plant because it's a central point for the whole Southeast, "from Miami, all the way up the East Coast to Virginia," Mizerowski said.
The Jacksonville fueling station will also make LNG available for the maritime industry, in support of Caribbean and Puerto Rican shippers, and for railroad, he said.
Sea Star Line and Crowley Maritime have both begun construction on LNG powered vessels. Sea Star's will be delivered in 2015, about the same time Clean Energy expects to open the Jacksonville LNG plant.
Railroads have begun testing LNG-fueled locomotives, according to industry reports.
Clean Energy's push to create a nationwide network of natural gas fueling stations was set back a year by a delay in manufacturing the new heavy-duty 12-liter LNG engines needed by trucking companies, Mizerowski said.
Delivery of those engines finally began in July.
As of October, Clean Energy has completed 105 stations at Pilot/Flying J travel centers. Seven of those are now open.
The company expects to open an LNG station built in Jacksonville at 460 S. Lane Ave. in January. Jacksonville carrier Raven Transport is one of Clean Energy's anchor clients for the station, Mizerowski said.