LNG as a fuel has existed for many years in Europe. Still, it has always been an outlier. This is about to change. Not only has the European Union pinned LNG on its clean air targets, but even single countries also come to realize that this is truly the only operational option for clean trucking. There are numerous fuelling stations in the planning and LNG can also be easily integrated into existing fuelling stations. Soon, one will be able to cross Europe on LNG.
Our neighbors are not inactive. North America already builds the second layer of LNG fueling, and the Asian juggernaut China has an aggressive gasification plan that covers transport as well.
There is no consistent network of LNG fueling stations in Europe yet but this is precisely what the EU aims at with the TEN_T initiative. Latest by 2025, there shall be an LNG fuelling station at no more than 400 km distance between each other on all TEN_T corridors. Individual countries may realize this goal quicker. LNG is also not as hard to get as it has been some years ago on world markets which pushes developments. Nowadays, each year there are more openings than in the preceding years.
Most LNG terminals today feature an LNG truck loading station. Finally, logistics companies and utilities start to build more of those stations starting with the Benelux and Spain in order to create the outlines of a meta-network. Soon it will be possible to cross Europe with a truck running on LNG without fear that there might not be a fuelling station. Truck drivers will still have to manage to fuel and plan ahead for quite a while but as those trucks may run for up to 1500 km on one fill, this is not an impossible task.
There are also plans for transporting LNG by rail into all of Europe which would allow the creation of distribution hubs at different points on the continent. LNG is no more the future – it has become the present for those with no fear of some innovation. Are you really prepared to risk being left behind and know absolutely nothing about what’s possible with LNG?