Could GX be the Rx for gasoline pump pain? Weighing the pros and cons

— I am in the market for a new car. It's time. My 1997 Honda Civic, purchased new, has served me faithfully for more than 14 years despite being soaked up to its bucket seats when Houston flooded during Tropical Storm Allison in 2001.

As a car buyer, I'm mindful of not just the up-front price but fuel efficiency. So one model I'm considering is Honda Civic's GX, currently the only car offered to the US market that is manufacturer-equipped to run on natural gas.

Honda launched the GX more than a decade ago, but for most of those years sold it only to fleet buyers such as municipalities, utilities and corporations. More recently it was offered to individual buyers in New York and California and later in Utah and Oklahoma. Starting with the 2012 model year, the GX will be available in 37 US states.

Although I fully intend to negotiate tough and hard, the GX's $25,500 list price -- about $5,000 more than a comparably-equipped Honda Civic EX that runs on regular gasoline -- is less important to me than its overall long-term costs that include fuel and maintenance.

The GX's fuel economy is roughly the same as a comparable Civic that runs on gasoline: about 25 miles per gallon city and 36 highway. Honda claims the cost of using natural gas is about 30% less than gasoline; four or five months ago when gasoline prices were 30-40 cents/gallon more at the pump and natural gas prices were slightly lower, the savings were greater.

According to the government's fuel economy website, the annual fuel cost for a GX a few months ago at higher gasoline prices was $1,034, based on compressed natural gas equivalently priced at $1.93/gal. By contrast, the annual gasoline cost for a regular Civic was $2,049/year, based on regular unleaded at $3.96/gal. That meant the GX snagged a yearly fuel savings of about $1,000.

However, as the cost of gasoline came down, the comparables are now $1,103/yr for a GX versus $1,915 for a gasoline-run Civic, based on respective fuel costs of $2.06/gal for natural gas and $3.50/gal for gasoline.

So as gasoline costs dropped recent weeks, so did the savings from a CNG-fueled car. And those statistics are for someone who drives 15,000 miles/year; for me, who drives about half that, the savings are sizably less. Between lower miles and lower recent gasoline costs, I'd only save about $500/year.

That drove home the point that price matters, to the point it might be much less worthwhile to buy a natural gas-fueled vehicle, from a strictly fuel cost savings viewpoint. By the way, these fuel costs would be the same for any similar-sized car -- Toyota Corolla, Nissan Senta, Ford Focus or Chevy Cruze.

If gasoline prices go back up, and I kept the car for the same 14 years I now have my 1997 model, over the long haul I might save fully half as much in fuel as the car's sticker price by buying a CNG-fueled car. Of course, that assumes the price of natural gas will always remain about half that of regular gasoline.

But if those who are proselytizing natural gas as a transport and possibly export fuel have their way, that commodity may become more in demand and therefore its price may rise.

Besides the inability to see into the future well enough to predict long-term natgas prices, another major drawback -- perhaps the chief one -- is a notable scarcity of CNG fueling stations. There are just a few in Houston, and only one is anywhere near my home.

Also, there is currently no federal tax break on a new CNG-fueled car; a $4,000 tax credit offered for years to new GX buyers expired at the end of 2010, although legislators continue to debate its renewal.

So there are yeas and nays on a natural gas-fueled car. Will I buy one? I'm not sure. I do feel appropriately bad about my share of the greenhouse gas problem, but is that enough to compensate for the inconvenience, lack of tax offset and variable fuel savings which are by no means guaranteed long-term?

Maybe I'll pay the bicycle shop a visit next week.

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