TULSA, Okla. - The price is right for motorists to be filling up with compressed natural gas, according to CNG experts. Tulsa World reports that fuel for CNG vehicles as fallen "well below $1" the gasoline equivalent at many Oklahoma stations, which are hovering around and above $3 per gallon.

The newspaper continues that the lower cost of CNG "stems from tumbling commodity prices, federal tax credits and other agreements."

Oklahoma Natural Gas (ONG) stations are selling CNG for about 75 cents per gallon of gasoline equivalent this week, which is down from $1.29 at the beginning of the year, spokesman Don Sherry told the newspaper. "It's a reflection of both low natural gas prices and a 50-cent per gallon federal tax credit," he said. ONG sells CNG at five Tulsa-area stations and has sold more than 450,000 in total gallons of gasoline equivalent.

American consumers, meanwhile, have been slow to embrace CNG as a fueling option. Oklahoma energy leaders such as T. Boone Pickens and George Kaiser are pushing for conversion of the nation's truck fleets to CNG as a means to help lower the nation??s dependence on imported oil, the newspaper reports.