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Lousiana's First Ford Natural Gas Dealer

20 April 1998

Hollingsworth Richards Ford Becomes Lousiana's First Ford Natural Gas Dealer

    BATON ROUGE, La., April 19 -- Hollingsworth Richards Ford in
Baton Rouge recently became the first Ford dealership in Louisiana
to begin offering natural gas vehicles.
    Hollingsworth Richards Ford already has an order from The Baton Rouge
Water Co. for six clean-burning natural gas F-250 pick-up trucks.  Also,
Hollingsworth is currently working with the city of Baton Rouge to help
educate fleets about the upcoming clean fuel fleet mandates through
alternative fuel vehicle drives and technical briefings.
    "We're offering natural gas vehicles because our customers asked us to
help prepare them to meet upcoming mandates that require a portion of
commercial and government fleets to be clean fuel vehicles (CFVs)," said Jimmy
Guidroz, Hollingsworth Business and Preferred Fleet Manager.  "We also
believe selling these vehicles will be good for the environment and our
business."
    Baton Rouge is one of eight metro areas covered by the federal
government's Clean Fuel Fleet Program.  According to the program, 30% of new
light duty and 50% of new heavy duty vehicles purchased by qualifying fleets
are required to be CFVs in the 1999 model year.  The percentage of light duty
vehicles increases to 50% in model year 2000.
    The local city government and natural gas fuel provider, Fuel-man, are
teaming up to help encourage the development of Baton Rouge's natural gas
vehicle (NGV) market.  The two are working to provide fleets with access to
natural gas refueling sites.
    "Natural gas is the fuel choice for Baton Rouge, because we have the fuel
availability to support natural gas vehicles," said Guidroz.  "We expect that
initial orders will be for bi-fueled vehicles.  Once the market and
infrastructure for natural gas grows, we should see more orders for dedicated
NGVs."
    Hollingsworth joins over 280 other Ford dealers around the country
certified to sell and service natural gas vehicles.  Ford offers the broadest
variety of NGVs of any auto maker.  In 1998, Ford's North American NGV lineup
includes six vehicle models -- dedicated F-Series pick-up trucks, Econoline
vans, and Crown Victoria sedans and bi-fuel F-Series, Econolines, and Contour
sedans.  In addition to natural gas, Ford offers alternative fuel vehicles
that run on electricity, propane, ethanol, or methanol.

SOURCE  Ford Motor Company