Friday, January 15, 2010 | Modified: Monday, January 18, 2010, 3:22am CST
Yellow Cab spending up to $8 million to shift taxi fleet to natural gasBut judge won’t let low-emissions taxis gain advantage at airports — at least not yet
Dallas Business Journal - by Jeff Bounds Staff writer
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In a bid to cut costs and get front-of-the-line privileges at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, the biggest taxi company in North Texas plans to convert nearly all of its company-owned cabs from gasoline to compressed natural gas.

Despite a total conversion cost that could exceed $8 million, Yellow Cab President Jack Bewley believes the change will ultimately lower expenses, in large part because compressed natural gas runs about $1.99 a gallon compared to $2.60 for a gallon of regular gasoline. Yellow Cab officials also believe prices of compressed natural gas will be more stable in the long run than those of gasoline.

In addition, Yellow Cab wants to take advantage of a program that D/FW Airport implemented late last year allowing taxis fueled by natural gas to jump to the front of the line for fares, Bewley said.

However, a state judge in Dallas this week issued a temporary restraining order putting a halt to the program, court documents show. Bewley declined to comment about how that might impact his company’s plans.

Beyond that, Yellow Cab is a member of a public-private initiative called the North Texas Green & Go Clean Taxi Partnership, which encourages the use of cabs with low emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants.

“It’s a major initiative,” he said. The company has 10 natural gas-powered vehicles on the road at the moment and orders for another 50, he added.

Yellow isn’t the only North Texas cab company that’s going green. For instance, in December, Cowboy Cab announced that it was adding seven natural-gas taxis to its fleet.

Yellow is the largest local cab company as measured by the number of drivers — 767 — that are authorized to do business at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, according to data from the airport.

In addition, the company owns or manages six other taxi services with a combined 325 drivers with authorization at D/FW Airport, according to Bewley and airport data. In total, that suggests Yellow and affiliated companies control roughly 52% of the airport’s taxi traffic.

As with other cab companies, Yellow’s drivers are independent contractors, and company cabbies who own the vehicles they drive will decide whether to convert them to compressed natural gas, Bewley said. “It will be up to them,” he said.

Yellow is paying for the conversions to compressed natural gas in-house, Bewley said. As many as 500 taxis could be converted at a cost of $10,000 to $15,000 per cab, he added.

Not all company-owned vehicles in the Yellow fleet will go through the conversion process, Bewley said.

There are some 30 vans that carry patrons in wheelchairs that will continue to run on gasoline. The reason: At the moment, nobody does conversions of vans of this type to natural gas, according to Bewley.

Yellow has between 30 and 40 hybrid vehicles that won’t be converted, he added.

Small market — for now
As of this week, there were 19 natural gas-powered taxis with permits to operate at D/FW Airport, according to David Magaña, the airport’s manager of public affairs.

By comparison, there are about 2,000 cabs with permits to serve D/FW Airport, Magaña said. The program giving front-of-the-line privileges to natural gas-powered taxis — at least temporarily on hold — is still in its infancy, he said.

And to be sure, natural gas isn’t yet suitable for all vehicles.

The tanks that hold compressed or liquefied natural gas take up nearly twice as much space in vehicles than do tanks that hold regular fuel, according to Jimmy Ramsey, business development manager at Clean Energy Fuels, a California company that supplies natural gas used in vehicles by Yellow Cab and Cowboy Cab, among others. Clean Energy Fuels was founded by North Texas energy investor T. Boone Pickens, who remains the largest shareholder of the business.

In addition to taking up more room for fuel tanks, natural gas is harder to find at the pump. There are only nine fueling stations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area for natural gas vehicles that are open to the public, Ramsey said. One of those fueling stations is located at the front of the line at D/FW Airport, and another is near Dallas Love Field.

As a fuel for vehicles, natural gas is “not ready for the every-day driver because you can’t go across America on it,” he said. But as driver fleets switch over to it, other users will follow, he said.

Clean Energy is looking to add another three to five natural-gas fueling stations in North Texas in the next year or so, Ramsey said.


Buck