The data from the Ministry of Infrastructure and Sustainable Mobility give a disheartening picture of the car market.

Hydrogen is the key player for the energy transition, central to the NRP, the National Recovery and Resilience Plan and the European Green Deal.

It is a difficult moment for the automobile market, which is trying to recover after the Covid period: in an ups and downs of numbers and percentages, burdened by the blows inflicted by the global crisis of the shortage of components. In addition the crisis in the supply of microchips has heavy repercussions on the production and delivery dates of cars. Finally, the government cut the incentives for the most popular cars, the ones that register an average CO2 emission between 61 to 135 gr/km. So unfortunately this past August, we witnessed a strong decrease of new car registrations (-27,47%) compared to a pre-pandemic August 2019, and an overall -20% in the period between January-August. Besides petrol and diesel fuelled cars that are in constant decline, we’d like to examine the alternative energy powered cars market. In fact, in August 2021 of the total number of car registered, half had alternative fuels and generally they represented 45,1% of the cars sold in the first eight months of the year, incrementing by 36,2% in the single month and by 155% since the beginning of the year. Electric cars represent more than 40% of the market share (41,6% in the month and 36% overall), while gas fuelled Cars represent 12% of the market share in August 2021 and 9,1% in the first eight months.

There are still too few ecological circulating cars: considering all of the alternative propulsions available, we reach 10.7% of the fleet in circulation, compared to 9.8% in 2019.

Socogas Group of Fidenza opened in the past few weeks a new service station that supplies liquid methane (LNG) and gaseous methane (L-CNG).

It is a well known and appreciated company on a national level, with over 200 employees in many locations and with a lot of companies affiliated to it. The plant is located less than 1 km from the Fidenza Salsomaggiore Terme A1 freeway exit. Exactly it is at the 1,840 OK of the Stare road 12 nearby the Fidenza Outlet Village and Fidenza Shopping Center.

The plant is Continuously supplied of liquefied natural gas, and independent from the methane pipeline network, so it is able to offer both liquid methane (LNG) for heavy vehicles,
and gaseous methane (L-CNG), obtained from the regasification of liquid methane, for cars and vans.

The offer is completed by petrol, diesel, LPG and an area dedicated for recharging electric and hybrid plug-in vehicles.

According to the data released by Acea, in the entire European Union including the EFTA countries and the United Kingdom, a total of 3,080,751 cars were registered in the first quarter of 2021. It is a + 0.9% compared to the same period in 2020. This year, after a heavy decrease in January (-25.7%) and February (-20.3%). Instead, March 2021 registered a positive trend in the European auto market, an increase of + 62.7% – equal to 1,387,924 units sold – compared to March 2020, which recorded exceptionally low volumes (-51.8%) due to the Covid-19 initial restrictions. In comparison with March 2019, however, the third month of 2021 is down by 22%, meaning that the strong losses of March 2020 were only partially offset. Volumes of alternative fuels cars sold are growing, with electric, hybrid and plug-in cars dominating the scene, while LPG and methane cars remain primarily an Italian choice for drivers.