T. Boone’s ‘Pickens Plan’: Spin the wind turbine
T. Boone Pickens helps bring wind energy to the center of the energy discussion and the center of the political aisle.
Misguided Probing
I don’t think it made the 3 minute clip CBS aired, but in the full 12 minute interview Katie Couric instantly goes after T. Boone Pickens about his financial aspirations of starting a wind farm. Now I’m no big T. Boone Pickens fan, but Katie, people start companies to make money (and tycoons usually start businesses to make billions). As much as you can fault the man for funding the swiftboat attack ads against John Kerry, or fault him for his influence on the Republican Party, you can’t fault the man for starting a business and wanting to make money.
I think Katie is trying to get T. Boone to say what everyone already knows (so why even waste time probing for a confession?) which is, T. Boone Pickens doesn’t care about the environment or the economic revival of rural economies as the well laid out spinning on his Pickens Plan website would like you to believe.
T. Boone Pickens cares about money–and he’s good at making it.
So why then, poke and prod a man who will put his tycoon-ish master mind to work on an energy source that will benefit the nation environmentally and economically?
Katie should’ve poked and prodded T. Boone for what was curiously left out of the Pickens Plan.
Unclear Nuclear Plans
The Pickens Plan website focuses on the development of wind energy (he is building the “world’s biggest wind farm” in Texas), and natural gas. At the very end it states:
The Pickens Plan is a bridge to the future — a blueprint to reduce foreign oil dependence by harnessing domestic energy alternatives, and buy us time to develop even greater new technologies.
It’s the “domestic energy alternatives” part that leaves me a bit suspect. I am going to bet that those “alternatives” may mean more nuclear reactors. Rod Adams does a good job of pointing out a possible link to Pickens’s wind aspirations and his potential overall plan for nuclear energy in his article on T. Boone. Adams links T. Boone’s plan with the plan of his Texas neighbor George Chapman who has announced plans to build two large nuclear reactors in Pickens’s hometown of Amarillo Texas. He also mentions that Pickens only brings up nuclear power at the very end of his Senate testimony on the future of American energy.
Center Stage
Wind energy is an environmental and economic issue, therefore it is an issue important to both sides of the political aisle. The fact that wind is an environmentalist’s dream energy source causes the issue to fall left of the aisle. The fact that an oil tycoon is investing in wind energy brings the issue back to center. This is important because issues at the center of the political aisle tend to have greater long term success as a result of the support from both sides. Oddly, issues funded by billionaires always seem to do well too…
We can only hope that Pickens will continue to financially assist wind farms until the central plains corridor (from Texas to Canada) reaches the 400,000 megawatt potential he projects. We can then go on to hope that wind, solar, geo-thermal, and tidal energy systems receive the funding and subsidies that the oil, coal, and nuclear industries enjoy. Maybe then clean energy can truly compete in the long term with its well-financed foes.
Related Posts
T. Boone Pickens Says Peak Oil Reached, Plans Largest Wind Farm
High Winds+Wind Farms=Falling Electricity Prices
The “Unlimited” Potential of American Wind Power: AWEA
image credit: Pickens Plan MySpace page
and Philipp Hertzog photo posted on Wikimedia Commons
Pickens Energy Plan Discussion Forum at : http://www.pickensenergyplan.com
Cheers !
i don’t believe mr. pickens is motivated to support wind power solely for personal financial gain at this stage of his life. i think he’s truly concerned about the economic well-being of this country if we don’t get off foreign oil as he correctly sees this dependence as fast-tracking us to the poorhouse. i also think he’s calculated correctly that it’s faster and more economically feasible to get wind farms up and running now than to drill for oil or to build the next generation nuclear power plants. go Pickens!
I find it interesting when people keep asserting that manufacturing and erecting thousands of wind turbines in remote areas will be a faster solution to reducing greenhouse gases than building nuclear power plants.
For some reason, the historical fact that the US managed to build 112 nuclear power plants in the short period from 1970-1990 escapes people. The other piece that really escapes them is the fact that the 104 nuclear power plants that continue to operate today produce more than 800 terrawatt-hours of electricity each year. That electricity has an economic value of between $40 and $80 billion at current electricity prices.
As an interesting side note - the entire US grid produced only about 650 terrawatt-hours in 1960.
It has nothing to do with the quantity of the subsidies - which stopped in about 1990, by the way. It has everything to do with the fact that uranium fission is a reliable source of emissions free heat that can be converted into massive quantities of electricity that is available 24 x 7 x 365 x 0.9.
Go Casey, I think you’re right on about T. Boone Pickens. I think this guy is 80 and has achieved all he needs to in terms of material wealth. He is now in a position of truly making a difference.
It seems that some people here regard personal financial gain as a bad thing. If Pickens can make another billion dollars selling something for which people willingly part with their money, good for him.
-jcr
Why hasn’t anyone mentioned T-boon’s plan for compressed natural gas cars? This is where he will make any money if that is his goal. Let’s not forget that we live in a capitalist society. Now to the problems with that part of the plan COST of distribution system (most likely on the back of the tax payer) and the cost of conversion on the vehicles to use the fuel. Same with yuckanol (ethanol) If the true goal is to decrease foreign oil use then there are far better off the shelf systems availible for electricity production. Capstone Micro Turbines are just one example. Nevada solar one 300 acres $266M for 64MW(continuous)-75MW(peek) = $4.156M per MW (Based on continuous output)
Capstone Micro Turbine less than one acre $1400 per KW = $1.4M per MW (The same continuous output for $175M less) And there is money to be made here too look at the stock price for Capstone. Cheap now and by using the cost compairson to convince people to buy more the stock will go up. Simple faster than any other option. Oh yea they don’t have to be conected to the grid that is ageing and in constant need of maintenance.
And as far as fuels for our vehicles go Butanol is the better choice for fermented fuel for the end user, because there is no need to modify or purchase a new vehicle to use it. As far as production numbers go from fermentation it matches yuckanol and one process also produces hydrogen as a byproduct thus making it even more energy productive than fermented yuckanol. If they made Butanol in 1916 by mistake since they were after acetone to make gun powder and the Butanol was a waste product then we darn sure can make it now, with all the tech advances we make in everything els, we can’t seem to make advances in efficency? LS9 and algae “bio crude” are better still than butanol. If all the money were to be concentrated on the best soulition then it will become a reality faster. America is smart enough to figure that out… or is it? Doesn’t seem so when one looks at all the yuckanol plants being built.(At best some of them aren’t useing corn.) Why? Look at every time there is a budget deficit in government what is among the first thing to be cut? Education. I say the first thing that should be cut is the pay for the crooks we elect to represent us. Pay them based on performance. Put them on Social Security and see how fast it gets fixed. Make them use medicare and see how fast that gets fixed. And please pass a law that says if someone in the meida points out a problem and critices a potential soulition then they have to also give a better soulition other wise they just need to shut their hole.
One last question I have is how does 3% of the total CO2 on earth make such a big impact on the warming of the planet?