Natural gas cars: Clean, green, going nowhere

More immediately, very few natural gas fueling pumps exist nationwide, and gas stations are unlikely to build more if the number of natural gas cars on the road remains insignificant. Honda’s “Phill” home refueling kit costs a few thousand dollars, and refueling the GX can take up to 16 hours if the tank is empty.

Another issue is range. The GX manages about 220 to 250 miles on a single tank, according to Honda, while the regular Civic can get some 500 miles on a tank. The reduced range makes the GX suitable as a commuter car, as the average American’s commute is around 30 miles round-trip, but there’s a concern that on longer drives, without the security of a fuel pump on “every corner,” you can become stranded, notes Phil Reed, consumer advice editor at Edmunds.com.

There are other drawbacks, too, Reed said. The engine is not as powerful as a regular Civic, and the trunk is smaller (to accommodate the fuel tank). And at $24,590, it’s substantially more expensive than a regular Civic, which costs $17,700 for a mid-trim model, he said.

“So you’d need to have strong conviction to own an environmentally responsible car, and a strong aversion to high gas prices,” said Reed. “The regular Civic is already getting good mileage, and the price premium you’d pay for the GX is already a tough nut to crack. But it does get you into that car pool lane.”

For O’Dell, the pluses outweigh the minuses. He reckons that when the extra cost of the GX is weighed against the money he saves on fuel, lower maintenance costs and government credits, he figures he’ll pay off the $6,890 difference over the regular Civic in fewer than seven years.

“What you have left is the value of your time,” he said. “With a home refueling station, you don’t have to go off the highway to refuel; you just plug in the car and go to bed at night, and if we ever start rioting in the street because of the cost of gasoline I’ll still be getting natural gas for my car at home.”

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