The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is going green with a fleet of LPG-powered vehicles. Park officials unveiled six new Ford F-250 crew-cab trucks that have been converted to use Autogas instead of gasoline, featuring Icom North America’s bi-fuel, liquid-injection propane system.

The authorities also announced the opening of two new refuelling stations, one located at the Park Headquarters Maintenance Facility in Tennessee, and a second at the South District Maintenance Facility in North Carolina.

This park is among a growing number of National Park Service units to begin using Autogas due to is environmental and economic benefits. The Great Smoky Mountains National Park has also converted grass mowers to use LPG.

“We increased our range, our driving range, by double, and decreased our down time substantially. So we have people in the field longer and it is less expensive,” said Brian Bergsma, Deputy Chief of Facility Maintenance

With this new alternative fuel equipment, the park implemented a next stage facet of the park’s Climate Friendly Parks programme through funding from a joint U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) and Department of Energy (DOE) initiative called the “Clean Cities National Park Initiative.”

The park installed the two LPG fuelling facilities and added the six new Autogas vehicles, in partnership with its two neighbouring DOE Clean Cities coalitions, the East Tennessee Clean Fuels Coalition and the Land of Sky Clean Vehicles Coalition. Want to know more? Please check here.