ATLANTA - Over the past month, UPS has deployed 300 new delivery trucks powered by compressed natural gas (CNG) to seven cities in Colorado, Georgia, Oklahoma, and California. They join more than 800 CNG vehicles already in use by UPS worldwide.

The CNG vehicles, part of an order placed last May, will allow UPS to further reduce its dependence on traditional fossil fuels such as gasoline and diesel and lower its carbon footprint. UPS already operates the largest private fleet of alternative fuel vehicles in its industry - 1,819 in total with these additions.

The new CNG trucks have been deployed over the past month to Denver (43); Atlanta (46); Oklahoma City (100), and four cities in California: Sacramento (21), San Ramon (63), Los Angeles (9) and Ontario (18). All now are in service.

The CNG truck bodies are identical externally to the signature-brown trucks that comprise the UPS fleet. Marked with decals as CNG vehicles, the trucks are expected to yield a 20 percent emissions reduction over the cleanest diesel engines available in the market today.

For its alternative fuel fleet, UPS has deployed CNG, liquefied natural gas, propane, electric, and hybrid-electric vehicles in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Germany, France, Brazil, Chile, Korea, and the United Kingdom. The company recently announced the purchase of seven hydraulic hybrid delivery vehicles and has conducted research with hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.