SAN DIEGO – San Diego's Clean Cities Coalition held a news conference Oct. 14 to highlight technologies and resources it claims are helping to reduce petroleum dependency in the San Diego region, reports VoiceofSanDiego.com. The Clean Cities Coalition is a regional group of about 50 fleets, local agencies, fuel providers, and vehicle manufacturers who voluntarily network under sponsorship from the federal Depart-ment of Energy to spread the use of alternative fuels and vehicles in the San Diego area. There are currently about 2,000 vehicles running on alternative fuels in the San Diego region, 750 of which operate in fleets of school buses, trash trucks, and company vehicles, and another 1,250 in the private sector. Most of these run on fuel alternatives such as biodiesel and natural gas, which still account for more gasoline displacement (94 percent) than the relatively newer technologies of electric and hybrid electric-gasoline vehicles. The coalition coordinates funding from the Department of Energy with grants from local agencies like the Air Pollution Control District to offset initial costs of alternative fuel technologies and continue to make them more economically feasible for fleets. Additionally, the coalition works to educate the public about an increasingly complex array of alternative energy options, each with its own costs and benefits.