Natural gas vehicles (NGV) sale, among the world's seven largest automobile markets, is expected to only reach 7.5 million units by 2020, according to a report for the Lux Research.
The slow growth of the vehicle sales is due to the industry's inability to gain profits from the cheap shale-driven natural gas, the report said.
Lux Research Senior Analyst Andrew Soare said, "Cheap natural gas is disrupting the electricity, chemical, and heating industries, but the impact on the transportation market has been minimal."
According to the report, the fuel price differentials, payback period for premium-priced NGVs and fueling infrastructure are the major drivers of growth, and not the technology innovation.
The seven key auto markets that are expected to hold about 75% of NGVs currently are the US, Europe, China, India, Brazil, Russia, and Japan.
Further, the report also revealed that India and China are the top NGV markets and are holding fifth and sixth positions respectively, but with low penetration of only 1%.
By 2015, the two countries are expected occupy the top two spots of the seven nations surveyed, with China likely to record sales of 540,000 units and India with sales of 250,000 vehicles.
