More use of pentane(+hexane+..) when compared with methane? [closed]








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Methane is one of most cleaner of vehicle fuels when compared with other hydrocarbons. It can be easily and continuously produced in form of biogas in biodigestors working on farm and animal wastes. What are the reasons and/or roadblocks that are keeping us from un tapping and harnessing such fuel instead of going for fossil fuels?




**Using methane as fuel in vehicles needs a method to deliver it to vehicles**


Methane is widely used as a fuel. It is the major component of natural gas, which is used to power domestic cookers and central heating boilers. It is also used to power gas turbines that generate electricity.


But all these application need a way to get the methane to the location where it is used. And that means pipelines. Needless to say, a car permanently connected to a gas pipe is a little inconvenient if you want to drive more than a few meters. 


There are, however, many gas-powered vehicles. But they require special infrastructure to deliver the gas and special tanks to store it under pressure. The pressure tanks in cars are heavy and expensive both of which lower the attractiveness compared to diesel or petrol which can simply be poured into an unpressurised tank as liquids. These extra factors lower the net attractiveness of methane (or, for similar reasons, hydrogen).


So methane may be cleaner and (often) cheaper than liquid fuels, but the overall costs of infrastructure and storage offset that advantage for most users.


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