The Natural Gas card is plays in nobody’s hand except Boone’s. He’s like the western barroom dealer that’s made a lifestyle of stacking the decks and keeping the piano player happy.

He’s a fair card shark though, he wants to give us wind power, a corridor, which you aptly point out.

Corridors through nations have synergies with all markets. I see a phone company rollout plan using the Wind Farms as wireless tower. That would get the telecom lobby on your side.

The economies of scale here are truly magnificent, perhaps the price you pay in these rural communities is being closer to the nuclear power plants, and you get free electricity in that community, that could be done. The sky’s the limit. A small nuclear accident or two in the United States is the lesser of two evils when the other is perpetual war for oil.

If the wars for oil ceased, I would live in one of those communities, of course the Wind Farms will be near them also. With all that electricity the vertical center of the United States will see population changes. This whole plan is huge, huge, huge, it’s amazing that http://www.pickensplan.com provides a wonderful glimpse into the behind the scenes production of this magnificent plan, this incredible poker game with energy policy.

I want this to happen now.

I’m sure that T. Boone Pickens will play any game that he can break even in or win to help this great nation remove itself from dependence on oil owned by persons we make war upon to wrest control of those resources.

I think Boone is a bit ashamed of where we are, perhaps the dealer let the wrong people into the game.

Let’s watch the show, and again, this Natrual Gas thing can go in other directions, including nuclear. I’m sure Boone plays bridge as well … well, maybe not.

The Natural Gas card is plays in nobody’s hand except Boone’s. He’s like the western barroom dealer that’s made a lifestyle of stacking the decks and keeping the piano player happy.

He’s a fair card shark though, he wants to give us wind power, a corridor, which you aptly point out.

Corridors through nations have synergies with all markets. I see a phone company rollout plan using the Wind Farms as wireless tower. That would get the telecom lobby on your side.

The economies of scale here are truly magnificent, perhaps the price you pay in these rural communities is being closer to the nuclear power plants, and you get free electricity in that community, that could be done. The sky’s the limit. A small nuclear accident or two in the United States is the lesser of two evils when the other is perpetual war for oil.

If the wars for oil ceased, I would live in one of those communities, of course the Wind Farms will be near them also. With all that electricity the vertical center of the United States will see population changes. This whole plan is huge, huge, huge, it’s amazing that http://www.pickensplan.com provides a wonderful glimpse into the behind the scenes production of this magnificent plan, this incredible poker game with energy policy.

I want this to happen now.

I’m sure that T. Boone Pickens will play any game that he can break even in or win to help this great nation remove itself from dependence on oil owned by persons we make war upon to wrest control of those resources.

I think Boone is a bit ashamed of where we are, perhaps the dealer let the wrong people into the game.

Let’s watch the show, and again, this Natrual Gas thing can go in other directions, including nuclear. I’m sure Boone plays bridge as well … well, maybe not.

You are right on a global scale, but it really does matter to me which BTU’s we are buying (oil BTUs from people that do not like us very much or natural gas BTUs from neighbors) during the time that we are building up our non-combustion alternatives.

You are right on a global scale, but it really does matter to me which BTU’s we are buying (oil BTUs from people that do not like us very much or natural gas BTUs from neighbors) during the time that we are building up our non-combustion alternatives.

The more the speculators and investors push the natgas price (the easiest oil substitute), the more appealing are sustainable non-combustion alternatives. Natgas is still a fossil fuel and its combustion creates millions of tons of GHG / GWe / year.

The more the speculators and investors push the natgas price (the easiest oil substitute), the more appealing are sustainable non-combustion alternatives. Natgas is still a fossil fuel and its combustion creates millions of tons of GHG / GWe / year.

(1) The grid must maintain a balance, at all times, that is the amount of electricity produce must equal the amount of electricity that is used.

(2) There is no known physical way to store large quantities of electricity (a very small amount can be stored by pumped storage– hydro damns. Batteries, and electrolysis produced hydrogen storage are a joke. The search for a practical large scale storage system has been the holy grail for about 40 years.

(3) The grid must be balanced all time in voltage, and frequency (voltage, about a 4 volt window, and frequency, about a 1 hertz window). If the 4 volt limit is exceeded, then power plants are tripped otherwise the grid would be damaged, (i.e. power plants, and transformers). If the voltage is less than this 4 volts, then we would initially have brownouts, and then rolling blackouts. For a major power incident, the grid would become unstable, and have to be shut down, over a wide area, and it could only come on line in steps (Wind generated electricty is useless in reenergizing th grid).

Natural gas is used in two ways. It is used for baseload production (combined cycle gas turbines, and for peakers, open cycle gas turbines). A combined cycle gas turbine has two stages, a gas turbine (like a jet engine), and a steam turbine which uses the exausts hot air from the gas turbine to produce steam which drives a generator. The open cycle gas turbine has only the 1st stage.

The combined cycle gas turbine is very efficient, about 50-55% efficient, however, it takes a long time to bring it up in temperature (up to 3 days), and this prohibits it use as a peaker–That is it cannot be cycled in temperature, and if it is used for peaking it must be operated in spinning reserve mode (generator tripped on and off the grid), and as a consequence its efficiency is drastically reduced, and its maintenace issues are increased.

The open cycle gas turbine, can be turned on and off quite rapidly, but its efficiency is low–about 20-25%. They are only used in the peaking mode.

Most of the new generating plants in the US are combined cycle gas turbines, because utilities cannot build coal, or nuclear power plants.

Wind generated electricity cannot be used in the peaking mode, because the electrical production (supply side) is governed by mother nature, and not by the demands of the grid (demand side). Electricity cannot be stored. Therefore wind generation must be used in a baseload configuration. However for a sufficient penetration into the generation mode wind power cannot replace conventional methods of generation, including combined cyle gas turbines. To give as an example, for a 100 megawatt wind farm, it can only replace about 4 megawatt of conventional natural gas generation. I refer the interesting reader to the Wind Energy Report (2005) (page 9) produced and published E-ON. E-on is the largest investor owned utility in the world, mostly in Germany, and Spain, and has control of the largest porfolio of wind energy in the world. WEB–

eon-netz.com, click on the english version of the 2005 wind energy report.

Because of the intermittant generation of electricity, and because wind farms are spread out over a large area, They are very inefficient in the use of electrical transmission lines. For example, transmission lines are “sized” for the maximum generated power (basic ohms, and kirchoffs laws). The energy produced by wind farms is proportional to the average power of these wind farms, not the peak power. Typically, say in Germany, the average power of wind is 18% of the peak power (called the capacity factor or feed-in capacity). In contrast, here in the US the capacity factor for a NUKE is 94-95%(data from Exelon Corp- and NEA). In addition NG baselode, and almost all other baseload is generated near the demand side (about 50 miles), not a 1000 miles (wind midwest to california, or wind midwest to the east coast)

The bottom line is that implementation of Pickens proposed plan would require construction of high voltage transmission power lines from the midwest to the rest of the United States equal to or exceeding all of the high voltage transmission lines currently in use in the continental US!!!

(1) The grid must maintain a balance, at all times, that is the amount of electricity produce must equal the amount of electricity that is used.

(2) There is no known physical way to store large quantities of electricity (a very small amount can be stored by pumped storage– hydro damns. Batteries, and electrolysis produced hydrogen storage are a joke. The search for a practical large scale storage system has been the holy grail for about 40 years.

(3) The grid must be balanced all time in voltage, and frequency (voltage, about a 4 volt window, and frequency, about a 1 hertz window). If the 4 volt limit is exceeded, then power plants are tripped otherwise the grid would be damaged, (i.e. power plants, and transformers). If the voltage is less than this 4 volts, then we would initially have brownouts, and then rolling blackouts. For a major power incident, the grid would become unstable, and have to be shut down, over a wide area, and it could only come on line in steps (Wind generated electricty is useless in reenergizing th grid).

Natural gas is used in two ways. It is used for baseload production (combined cycle gas turbines, and for peakers, open cycle gas turbines). A combined cycle gas turbine has two stages, a gas turbine (like a jet engine), and a steam turbine which uses the exausts hot air from the gas turbine to produce steam which drives a generator. The open cycle gas turbine has only the 1st stage.

The combined cycle gas turbine is very efficient, about 50-55% efficient, however, it takes a long time to bring it up in temperature (up to 3 days), and this prohibits it use as a peaker–That is it cannot be cycled in temperature, and if it is used for peaking it must be operated in spinning reserve mode (generator tripped on and off the grid), and as a consequence its efficiency is drastically reduced, and its maintenace issues are increased.

The open cycle gas turbine, can be turned on and off quite rapidly, but its efficiency is low–about 20-25%. They are only used in the peaking mode.

Most of the new generating plants in the US are combined cycle gas turbines, because utilities cannot build coal, or nuclear power plants.

Wind generated electricity cannot be used in the peaking mode, because the electrical production (supply side) is governed by mother nature, and not by the demands of the grid (demand side). Electricity cannot be stored. Therefore wind generation must be used in a baseload configuration. However for a sufficient penetration into the generation mode wind power cannot replace conventional methods of generation, including combined cyle gas turbines. To give as an example, for a 100 megawatt wind farm, it can only replace about 4 megawatt of conventional natural gas generation. I refer the interesting reader to the Wind Energy Report (2005) (page 9) produced and published E-ON. E-on is the largest investor owned utility in the world, mostly in Germany, and Spain, and has control of the largest porfolio of wind energy in the world. WEB–

eon-netz.com, click on the english version of the 2005 wind energy report.

Because of the intermittant generation of electricity, and because wind farms are spread out over a large area, They are very inefficient in the use of electrical transmission lines. For example, transmission lines are “sized” for the maximum generated power (basic ohms, and kirchoffs laws). The energy produced by wind farms is proportional to the average power of these wind farms, not the peak power. Typically, say in Germany, the average power of wind is 18% of the peak power (called the capacity factor or feed-in capacity). In contrast, here in the US the capacity factor for a NUKE is 94-95%(data from Exelon Corp- and NEA). In addition NG baselode, and almost all other baseload is generated near the demand side (about 50 miles), not a 1000 miles (wind midwest to california, or wind midwest to the east coast)

The bottom line is that implementation of Pickens proposed plan would require construction of high voltage transmission power lines from the midwest to the rest of the United States equal to or exceeding all of the high voltage transmission lines currently in use in the continental US!!!

A few facts and history:

. The amount of recoverable petroleum in this area, could supply all the gasoline/diesel, for all of the cars, SUVs, and Trucks in the US for 210 years!

. During the late 1970s and early 1980s a major effort was undertaken to develop this source, under the synfuels program of the Carter Administration. Exxon was the major player. At its peak, there were 2200 employees working on the development.

. Exxon abandoned this program due to the fact the bottom fell out of petroleum prices, and the technology used was an environmental disaster (i.e mining the shale( a 1000 feet of overburden) , bringing the shale to the surface, and then retorting the shale for the kerogen (producing a lot of very nasty aerosols).

. Shell Oil Company has been working for 20 years on In Situ extraction of the kerogen, and I believe that have the problem solved. They have produced with there very small pilot program about 2000 barrels of oit. Briefly there technology incorporates freezing of the oil shale (with refigerants), at its perimeter, and then cooking the oil shale in situ, with ELECTRICAl HEATING elements to temperatures of from 500 to 700 F. The frozen shale at the perimeter stabilizes the contamination.

. This technique requires a lot of ELECTRICAL ENERGY.

. A lot of electrical generation is required.

. Available water(cooling towers ) is the achilles heal for this method, since this area is almost a desert.

. This is where the transmission lines comes into play. The gulf coast in Texas has plenty of water, but no coal for the power plants. Nuclear Power Units (About 10 of the latest Japanese designed 1400 megawatt electrical), could be sited along the gulf coast.

. If this method works then after about 3 years after the Nuke plants, and transmission energy corridors were in operation the US could be completely free of imported oil. That is saving about $700 billion dollars per year, which is now shipped overseas.

This is T. Boone Pickens’s ace in the hole. He has control over the Energy Corridors in Texas, and maybe some leading out of Texas.

Problems with this method:

The problems with this method all all institutional, and not technical.

(1) There is now a federal law which embargos the development of oil shale on federal lands(most of the oil shale is on BLM land), coupled with state laws in colorado.

(2) You are well aware of the institutional bottlenecks governing building Nukes.

(3) The Energy corridors would involve several states. The control of High Voltage transmission lines is currently Balkanized (i.e. Each State has a veto power), However, I believe that there is a law in place which would allow the FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Committee) to supercede any bottlenecks from individual states.

(4) Financing for the construction of the 10 NUKEs

(5) The United States does not currently have the technical capability to build these NUKES. The design, and licensing would have to be imported from Japan. We do not have the technically capability to actually build these plants. We do not have the in-house reservoir of technicians, craftsmen (example nuclear qualified welders), and engineers to actually build the plant. The main nuclear reactor pressure vessal would have to be fabricated in Japan. The steam generator probably from Japan. The incore instrumentation, such as thermocouples, and neutron detectors, could be produced in the US, however the technology to weld place the detectors in the reactor core is not available in the US. This is the result of our disfunctional energy policy for the last 30 years.

A few facts and history:

. The amount of recoverable petroleum in this area, could supply all the gasoline/diesel, for all of the cars, SUVs, and Trucks in the US for 210 years!

. During the late 1970s and early 1980s a major effort was undertaken to develop this source, under the synfuels program of the Carter Administration. Exxon was the major player. At its peak, there were 2200 employees working on the development.

. Exxon abandoned this program due to the fact the bottom fell out of petroleum prices, and the technology used was an environmental disaster (i.e mining the shale( a 1000 feet of overburden) , bringing the shale to the surface, and then retorting the shale for the kerogen (producing a lot of very nasty aerosols).

. Shell Oil Company has been working for 20 years on In Situ extraction of the kerogen, and I believe that have the problem solved. They have produced with there very small pilot program about 2000 barrels of oit. Briefly there technology incorporates freezing of the oil shale (with refigerants), at its perimeter, and then cooking the oil shale in situ, with ELECTRICAl HEATING elements to temperatures of from 500 to 700 F. The frozen shale at the perimeter stabilizes the contamination.

. This technique requires a lot of ELECTRICAL ENERGY.

. A lot of electrical generation is required.

. Available water(cooling towers ) is the achilles heal for this method, since this area is almost a desert.

. This is where the transmission lines comes into play. The gulf coast in Texas has plenty of water, but no coal for the power plants. Nuclear Power Units (About 10 of the latest Japanese designed 1400 megawatt electrical), could be sited along the gulf coast.

. If this method works then after about 3 years after the Nuke plants, and transmission energy corridors were in operation the US could be completely free of imported oil. That is saving about $700 billion dollars per year, which is now shipped overseas.

This is T. Boone Pickens’s ace in the hole. He has control over the Energy Corridors in Texas, and maybe some leading out of Texas.

Problems with this method:

The problems with this method all all institutional, and not technical.

(1) There is now a federal law which embargos the development of oil shale on federal lands(most of the oil shale is on BLM land), coupled with state laws in colorado.

(2) You are well aware of the institutional bottlenecks governing building Nukes.

(3) The Energy corridors would involve several states. The control of High Voltage transmission lines is currently Balkanized (i.e. Each State has a veto power), However, I believe that there is a law in place which would allow the FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Committee) to supercede any bottlenecks from individual states.

(4) Financing for the construction of the 10 NUKEs

(5) The United States does not currently have the technical capability to build these NUKES. The design, and licensing would have to be imported from Japan. We do not have the technically capability to actually build these plants. We do not have the in-house reservoir of technicians, craftsmen (example nuclear qualified welders), and engineers to actually build the plant. The main nuclear reactor pressure vessal would have to be fabricated in Japan. The steam generator probably from Japan. The incore instrumentation, such as thermocouples, and neutron detectors, could be produced in the US, however the technology to weld place the detectors in the reactor core is not available in the US. This is the result of our disfunctional energy policy for the last 30 years.

The observation regarding nuclear is apt, and if Pickens doesn’t intend it, others will bring it up. Clearly, the huge obstacle is the lengthy permitting process required in most states. However, with an HVDC line nearby, then states have the option of making nuclear generation a state industry- eg- their legislature might be willing to streamline the permitting if such a national distribution grid were in place. The attractive portion for large investors is that small conservative or underpopulated states like Utah or North Dakota might be more easily motivated by nuclear lobbying.

I am surprized that there was no treatment of grid energy storage in the plan, and that precious little space was given to description of the thing that was going to cost the 200 billion dollars: the transmission grid.