OREANDA-NEWS. April 01, 2011. OJSC KAMAZ and "Almazy Rossii-Sakha” State-Owned Mining Company (“ALROSA” Company Limited) arrived at a common opinion that compressed natural gas (CNG) used as motor fuel in utility trucks is economically efficient.

A conference for managers and specialists of these old business partners has recently been held in Mirny, the Republic of Sakha-Yakutia, which is called “the diamond capital” of Russia’s Far East. The delegation of “ALROSA” company Limited was headed by Yury Doynikov, First Vice President – CEO, and the delegation of KAMAZ was led by Rafael Batyrshin, Director General of OOO RariTEK. Jointly with its partner producing, selling and maintaining vehicles running on CNG in Naberezhnye Chelny, KAMAZ has been actively promoting its gas-powered trucks and buses on the Russian market, developing a gas engine strategy and introducing alternative fuels for the Russian vehicles for several years. “The Standard of Maintenance of Bottle-Gas Driven Vehicles Running on Compressed Natural Gas for Service Centers” was also jointly developed by the partners.

The parties discussed the application of methane as engine fuel for KAMAZ trucks, considered the problems of service of gas equipment installed on them and trainings of their operators. One of important issues for discussion was also organization of filling stations for cars at the production sites located far away from each other. Rafael Batyrshin, Director General of OOO RariTEK, spoke at the conference on “KAMAZ vehicles on natural gas as a tool for energy conservation and efficiency". His colleague, Yury Shport, Director General of OOO "Remontno-mekhanicheskiy Zavod RariTEK”, told about organization of a service center for bottle-gas driven KAMAZ vehicles on the example of his company.

The speakers and those managers and specialists of KAMAZ and ALROSA who expressed their opinions at the conference unanimously appreciated the necessity and prospects of switching over to the use of CNG fuel for vehicles used by the leading enterprises of Russia’s diamond industry: CNG is fuel of the future.