T. Boone Pickens for President – or something

Published on July 16th, 2008

Posted by Eideard in Politics, Technology

Don’t know if this commercial is showing up on TV around the whole country or not. Here in the Southwest, we seem to get it just about every day. It feels like it should end with Pickens saying, “I’m T. Boone Pickens and I approved this message.”.

Pickens is building the largest wind turbine project in the country over in the Texas Panhandle. There are a number of interesting and serious profit-making aspects of the project. Mostly long-range and all seem to be an advancement over his decades of making money from drilling for oil.

I’ve blogged previously about the project as has Craig Rubens. A Texas land and oil baron this size is always scary; but, he’s also done a pretty good job of making money for people – in addition to himself.

His significant core plan for sorting out transportation is switching away from oil derivatives to natural gas. Something we have a lot of as a natural resource. Take a look at his project’s website – www.pickensplan.com – and see what you think?

20 users responded in " T. Boone Pickens for President – or something "

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# 1 Angus said, on July 16th, 2008 at 8:05 am

Don’t get all giddy. Pickens is not doing this for the good of mankind, any more than NBC and GE’s green initiative is. They’re doing this becuase they think they can make money on it, not to save the world.

# 2 Sea Lawyer said, on July 16th, 2008 at 8:11 am

#1, how amazingly astute of you.

# 3 C0mdrData said, on July 16th, 2008 at 8:15 am

I say, if someone wants to make a little money while he saves the world,…let him.

# 4 ArianeB said, on July 16th, 2008 at 8:21 am

“His significant core plan for sorting out transportation is switching away from oil derivatives to natural gas. Something we have a lot of as a natural resource.”

Very very bad idea. We may have a lot of natural gas (world wide it is in decline) but natural gas is a primary ingredient in fertilizer, and of course is used primarily to heat homes. If we use it for transportation (beyond mass transit), it will have no effect on gas prices, and just delay the inevitable mess we are headed for.

Inevitably we have to abandon the internal combustion engine and convert transportation to electricity: Electric cars, light rail, electrified rails for long distance transportation. Solar, wind, and geothermal are inexhaustible sources we are not using enough of, that can supply the electricity needed for transportation.

# 5 lmj3325 said, on July 16th, 2008 at 8:21 am

#2, how amazingly “douchey” of you.

# 6 r_and_om said, on July 16th, 2008 at 8:45 am

it’s playing in the southeast as well~

# 7 Calin said, on July 16th, 2008 at 9:24 am

Saw it here in Kentucky a couple of weeks ago.

# 8 eyeofthetiger said, on July 16th, 2008 at 9:44 am

If the midwest has these 10,000 turbine wind farms I would have to assume that the climate patterns would be affected. Also, no one would want to live around them because they are loud and destroy the view of a thousand bland neighborhoods. There could be an arguable location for them on golf course, of course.

# 9 chuck said, on July 16th, 2008 at 11:48 am

You guys buy more than half of the “foreign” oil from us guys in Canada.

Thanks for the money! eh?

# 10 MikeN said, on July 16th, 2008 at 1:08 pm

He wants to maintain and expand the government’s subsidy for wind energy. Allowing for more offshore drilling of natural gas is something liberals won’t accept.

Not sure how a natural gas pipeline would work either.

Nevertheless, he’s at least making suggestions.

# 11 MikeN said, on July 16th, 2008 at 1:13 pm

T Boone Pickens,
H Ross Perot,

If he’s scheduled to appear on Larry King, then we know it’s on.

# 12 Sea Lawyer said, on July 16th, 2008 at 1:49 pm

#10, the question is: if this endeavor is supposed to be such a profitable one, why is the government handing out subsidies in the first place?

# 13 RSweeney said, on July 16th, 2008 at 4:38 pm

Wind power is dangerous to rely upon, earlier this summer, the Texas power grid almost collapsed after a sudden calm shut down most of the state’s wind turbines. Just a few more turbines and Texas would have gone dark until the wind picked back up.

# 14 deowll said, on July 16th, 2008 at 6:09 pm

This guy is at the right age to want to save the nation and leave something behind besides a lot of money he didn’t spend.

Whatever his real motives I think he has a vision and both feet on the ground and some idea of how to actually achieve the goal.

This is a lot more than I can say for anybody else. If he can make money doing it that is the American way.

We need to get off the imported energy as much as we can or we are going under.

Why?

Because my best guess is with more paper going out than paper coming in people are going to stop wanting our paper. The fall in the value of dollar can stop oil imports cold and I don’t own a horse.

# 15 Glenn E. said, on July 16th, 2008 at 8:21 pm

Isn’t it nice how these billionares and multibillion dollar corporations are suddenly taking an interest (a controlling interest) in alternative energy tech? Chevron owns NiMH battery technology and controls most of the world’s Geothermal well plants. Exxon/Mobile owns the Lithium Ion battery technology. And not Pickens wants to do (or own) the solar and wind generating technology. Who believes it’s all out of the goodness of their hearts? And not a profit motive? These billionares aren’t going to loose a dime, if they can help it, from any move to alternatives.

# 16 Ksenia said, on July 16th, 2008 at 11:36 pm

Ugh. I saw this tonight here in Seattle, and I think to myself, no matter where I move, I’m going to hear about Pickens. He bought up a good chunk of the water rights back home in the Panhandle, he’s by no means a conservationist nor an environmentalist. Just check out the recent issue of Fast Company where he talks about deploying a massive windfarm in Pampa, Texas. They ask him if he’s going to put them on his own land to which he replies with a chuckle “Hell no!” I guess the free market works in mysterious ways ^-^

# 17 Drew said, on July 17th, 2008 at 4:37 am

If he makes a profit, WHO CARES? Why is profit bad? Profit is what got you the shiny computer on your desk you’re typing on, and what got the Internet connection to your door.

I don’t understand why everyone is so quick to point out that he is making money? I applaud the effort, but agree that there are doubts about wind energy as “sustainable” as not only are there lulls in wind, there are blasts that could damage the grid by putting too much power in, supposedly.

# 18 qsabe said, on July 17th, 2008 at 1:28 pm

If we have plenty of natural gas, why has my gas bill increased 30 percent in the last two months.

# 19 Melissa Davis said, on July 27th, 2008 at 7:43 am

I hope he does make money at it and he helps us save some. If he doesn’t profit from it, then not only will he not be able to maintain his plan, but he also wont be able to continually improve upon it. Its a good plan and so far, nobody else seems to have one.

and to the comment about wind turbines: go take a long drive through the countryside of italy and see what an amazingly beautiful exerience that is. The turbines themselves are a beautiful sight to see and they are there for a positive reason. Those bland neighborhoods may welcome such a beautiful sight!

# 20 dottie said, on August 5th, 2008 at 11:11 am

Natural Gas is so expensive, because we are not going after new reserves in the USA. The companies that are controlling the industry now love that the Feds won’t allow new exploration. Meanwhile with Natural Gas Deregulation in most states, they can raise prices and hold us hostage. Price per therm has gone up over 50% in one year for home supply.

The USA is the only country restricting energy exploration on our own turf.

If we are going to keep consuming and keep allowing millions of new people into the USA that keep consuming, we are going to have to utilize several types of energy, including solar and wind. It will take it all.

If we would have allowed this 20 years ago, we would be enjoying the benefits now. Instead we still have idiotic congress critters, they are voting no because “we would not see any benefits for 10-20 years. As pointed out on Larry King, would we not love to have the benefits now with the wait they predicted 20 years ago.

Obama wants to help the car industry again. I would rather a Wind/solar subsidy than more of this bull. They had their chance back in the 70’s and they did nothing. The minute the heat was off a bit, the produced crappy quality gas guzzling, polluting cars and trucks with the federal governments blessing.

The US car industry deserves to burn in hell.

Obama and Mcain are clueless on an Energy Policy and most of Congress has no working knowledge of what is going on.

Look at some of the states, Georgia, with some of the worst air quality, gives no incentives for hybrid vehicles.

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