2011 Energy Vision Corporate Leadership Awards

Westport Innovations Inc., a Canadian company based in Vancouver, British Columbia, has been the global leader in developing engines that can be powered by compressed, liquefied and renewable natural gas. Its high performance engines for urban buses and trucks, marketed through a Westport/ Cummins joint venture, have been the essential ingredient in the burgeoning use of heavy duty natural gas vehicles over the last decade in the U.S. and around the world.

 

Westport’s early grasp of the need for a major shift in transportation to the cleaner, petroleum-free fuels of the future and its years of research and development, have produced the engines that now enable heavy duty vehicles to leave their reliance on oil behind. These vehicles consume 23% of all highway fuels. As fleets shift from diesel to natural gas fuel, they save money from the lower price of this fuel. They are much cleaner, lower in greenhouse gas emissions, and quieter. In addition, they are poised to move to an even better gas fuel that is just beginning to be produced in the U.S., a renewable natural gas made from wastes, which requires no drilling, is virtually pollution-free, and is the lowest carbon fuel available anywhere.

 

Westport is steadily expanding its line of engines and its collaboration with other companies aimed at incorporating Westport technologies into their engines, exploring future clean vehicle opportunities, and marketing their products.  Just this year, Westport launched a co-marketing program with Shell, offering a convenient package to North American customers of refueling stations and liquefied natural gas vehicles plus construction and maintenance services. Westport developed “bi-fuel” engine systems that can run on natural gas or gasoline for Ford’s popular F-250 and F-350 pick-up trucks that Ford will sell and service. Westport also concluded an agreement with General Motors to design engines for its vehicles and opened a research facility in Michigan.

 

The Westport group of companies has sold over 32,000 natural gas and propane engines to customers in over 20 countries. Westport has been ranked on the 2008, 2009 and 2010 annual list of Canada's top corporate citizens published by Corporate Knights magazine.

 

Charlie Ker, who is with both Westport Innovations and the joint venture Cummins/Westport, joins Energy Vision to receive Westport’s Corporate Leadership Award.