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Pickens Plan

Goodpasture

Well-known member
T Boone Pickens said:
America is in a hole and it's getting deeper every day. We import 70% of our oil at a cost of $700 billion a year - four times the annual cost of the Iraq war.

I've been an oil man all my life, but this is one emergency we can't drill our way out of. But if we create a new renewable energy network, we can break our addiction to foreign oil.

On January 20, 2009, a new President gets sworn in. If we're organized, we can convince Congress to make major changes towards cleaner, cheaper and domestic energy resources.

Pretty good stuff here.......Pickens is nothing if not smart........A lot of what he is saying was done prior to this by R Buckminster Fuller's World Game in the late 60's.

http://www.pickensplan.com/theplan/

Studies from around the world show that the Great Plains states are home to the greatest wind energy potential in the world — by far.

The Department of Energy reports that 20% of America's electricity can come from wind. North Dakota alone has the potential to provide power for more than a quarter of the country.

Today's wind turbines stand up to 410 feet tall, with blades that stretch 148 feet in length. The blades collect the wind's kinetic energy. In one year, a 3-megawatt wind turbine produces as much energy as 12,000 barrels of imported oil.

Wind power currently accounts for 48 billion kWh of electricity a year in the United States — enough to serve more than 4.5 million households. That is still only about 1% of current demand, but the potential of wind is much greater.

A 2005 Stanford University study found that there is enough wind power worldwide to satisfy global demand 7 times over — even if only 20% of wind power could be captured.

Building wind facilities in the corridor that stretches from the Texas panhandle to North Dakota could produce 20% of the electricity for the United States at a cost of $1 trillion. It would take another $200 billion to build the capacity to transmit that energy to cities and towns.

That's a lot of money, but it's a one-time cost. And compared to the $700 billion we spend on foreign oil every year, it's a bargain.
An economic revival for rural America.

Developing wind power is an investment in rural America.

To witness the economic promise of wind energy, look no further than Sweetwater, Texas.

Sweetwater was typical of many small towns in middle-America. With a shortage of good jobs, the youth of Sweetwater were leaving in search of greater opportunities. And the town's population dropped from 12,000 to under 10,000.

When a large wind power facility was built outside of town, Sweetwater experienced a revival. New economic opportunity brought the town back to life and the population has grown back up to 12,000.

In the Texas panhandle, just north of Sweetwater, is the town of Pampa, where T. Boone Pickens' Mesa Power is currently building the largest wind farm in the world.

At 4,000 megawatts — the equivalent combined output of four large coal-fire plants — the production of the completed Pampa facility will double the wind energy output of the United States.

In addition to creating new construction and maintenance jobs, thousands of Americans will be employed to manufacture the turbines and blades. These are high skill jobs that pay on a scale comparable to aerospace jobs.

Plus, wind turbines don't interfere with farming and grazing, so they don't threaten food production or existing local economies.

Some of you with ranches, have you explored getting into the wind turbine business? If not, why not?
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
We had a big wind turbine generation plan set up for the northern part of our county...They had the power line plans drawn- held hearings and got approval from all the landowners and BLM the lines passed thru (about 30-40 miles)...
Then in moved the bunny huggers and the save the sagebrush folks-- first they whittled the size down because parts of it were too close to a proposed wilderness area (Bitter Creek)- then whittled more on federal land down because it would endanger the wild birds (eagles, sage hens, sparrows, bats- whatever?)- so it pretty much left just allowing the turbines on the ranchers deeded land-- which wouldn't generate enough power to justify putting in the big power lines-- so as it sets now- the project is kind of dead in the water....
 

aplusmnt

Well-known member
Oldtimer said:
We had a big wind turbine generation plan set up for the northern part of our county...They had the power line plans drawn- held hearings and got approval from all the landowners and BLM the lines passed thru (about 30-40 miles)...
Then in moved the bunny huggers and the save the sagebrush folks-- first they whittled the size down because parts of it were too close to a proposed wilderness area (Bitter Creek)- then whittled more on federal land down because it would endanger the wild birds (eagles, sage hens, sparrows, bats- whatever?)- so it pretty much left just allowing the turbines on the ranchers deeded land-- which wouldn't generate enough power to justify putting in the big power lines-- so as it sets now- the project is kind of dead in the water....

So many things like this are killed by the Liberal tree huggers.

I think it may take a depression and probably another world war to flush all this crap out and give things a new start! People have became so spoiled that they do not appreciate the order of the food chain!
 

fff

Well-known member
I didn't see the actual plan but I do have a few questions. If this is to be a non-government funded program, why does he want to meet with the presidential candidates? Natural gas is more efficient than wind power. And most confusing to me: why would we want to convert our cars from oil to natural gas? Why not from oil to a non-fossil fuel?
 

aplusmnt

Well-known member
fff said:
And most confusing to me: why would we want to convert our cars from oil to natural gas? Why not from oil to a non-fossil fuel?

Just a guess but I would assume because I imagine all current cars in existence could be converted over to Natural gas (in theory) I remember 20 some years ago a local farmer had his Ton truck set up to run on propane or gasoline. I assume Natural gas would be the same as that.

It only takes a few modifications to run on natural gas, versus virtual impossible to convert a car over to say Solar power or some other non fossil fuel.

And I believe we have a great supply of natural gas?
 

fff

Well-known member
aplusmnt said:
fff said:
And most confusing to me: why would we want to convert our cars from oil to natural gas? Why not from oil to a non-fossil fuel?

Just a guess but I would assume because I imagine all current cars in existence could be converted over to Natural gas (in theory) I remember 20 some years ago a local farmer had his Ton truck set up to run on propane or gasoline. I assume Natural gas would be the same as that.

It only takes a few modifications to run on natural gas, versus virtual impossible to convert a car over to say Solar power or some other non fossil fuel.

And I believe we have a great supply of natural gas?

I think there's a good supply of natural gas. Much electricity is generated with it in very efficient plants. Consider if we all shift our cars to burning natural gas. Where will you fill up? What will it cost for the infastructure to build, support, transport natural gas stations? On the other hand, if we get highly efficient gasoline burning cars, all that is already available. Or electric cars wouldn't need any or much new infastructure. Mercedes- Benz says they won't be producing gasoline burning cars by 2015. If they can do it, why can't a US car company do it? I just don't understand why we should spend all this money and time coverting to another fossil fuel. I see T Boone is going to run several commercials outlining his plan. Guess I'll watch and see.
 

aplusmnt

Well-known member
fff said:
aplusmnt said:
fff said:
And most confusing to me: why would we want to convert our cars from oil to natural gas? Why not from oil to a non-fossil fuel?

Just a guess but I would assume because I imagine all current cars in existence could be converted over to Natural gas (in theory) I remember 20 some years ago a local farmer had his Ton truck set up to run on propane or gasoline. I assume Natural gas would be the same as that.

It only takes a few modifications to run on natural gas, versus virtual impossible to convert a car over to say Solar power or some other non fossil fuel.

And I believe we have a great supply of natural gas?

I think there's a good supply of natural gas. Much electricity is generated with it in very efficient plants. Consider if we all shift our cars to burning natural gas. Where will you fill up? What will it cost for the infastructure to build, support, transport natural gas stations? On the other hand, if we get highly efficient gasoline burning cars, all that is already available. Or electric cars wouldn't need any or much new infastructure. Mercedes- Benz says they won't be producing gasoline burning cars by 2015. If they can do it, why can't a US car company do it? I just don't understand why we should spend all this money and time coverting to another fossil fuel. I see T Boone is going to run several commercials outlining his plan. Guess I'll watch and see.

Infrastructure has always been one of the biggest issues.

The Point is no matter what we have in future, and I am an big advocate of batter powered cars. We still will have a lot of cars that need to burn some sort of fossil fuel. My wife's, 65 Mustang nor my sons 70 chevelle will never be battery powered, but they could easily be converted to natural gas.

Personally I believe we need to drill more and get more oil for those vehicles that need it aka farming etc......but also let the market design battery cars for the common city folk to drive.

The Chevy volt is the right direction, you can run on battery exclusive until they go dead then use gas motor. So when I drive around my town I am battery only, but when I head to Tulsa to eat at Hooters I can switch to gasoline so do not end up stranded with and hooterless!
 
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