T Boone Pickens

desdawg · July 22, 2008, 09:14:47 PM

I just watched T Boone Pickens pitch his energy plan to a US Senate committee. He is the only person I have seen arrive at a workable energy solution for the US. Not only is it an energy plan but an economic plan to liberate the US from using all of our resources to purchase foreign oil resources. He may be my write in candidate on election day. Neither of the D&R candidates has a clue as near as I can tell. In his closing statement he said I am an American first and an oil man second. His was a very persuasive and convincing message perhaps beause it was based on a common sense approach. Did anyone else see or hear it? Pickens is the founder and chairman of BP, beyond petroleum.
Pickens plan is to use Natural Gas and every other energy source available in the US to bridge the gap between our dependence on foreign oil and converting to producing electricity using wind and solar methodologies. On a large scale natiowide. By his estimation if we drill offshore and in ANWAR that will only produce about a 50 year supply. Developing natural gas vehicles and getting started with the renewables, wind & solar would reduce oil consumption by 38%. He was careful to state that NG is not going to help with the heavy haulers that being the consumption required for 18 wheelers and RR locomotives. It was a very good presentation, instilled a little hope in a hopeless situation. Bottom line-keep the money at home and reduce dependance on foreign oil. I had to like it.

ScottA · July 22, 2008, 09:31:11 PM

I agree that we need to keep the money at home but there is much much more to the oil story than anyone is telling. I remember lots of drill and cap wells being sunk back in the 80's around Oklahoma. Many of those wells are now being put into production over 20 years after they where drilled. How many more wells are out there waiting to go online? My guess is plenty. I've heard for many years that our energy plan is to use up everyone elses oil first. As a result production has been kept low in the US by design. Don't worry all those dollars going overseas aren't really lost. We get a big part of them back in the form of bond purchaces by the Arab nations. I've come to the conclusion that the reason oil is so high today is so they can afford to buy more of our debt and cover the bills for the present and comming wars. Think about it...if the money only flowed one way we'd have all been broke years ago. Support our troops! Drive an SUV.

July 22, 2008, 10:29:43 PM

Sorry I missed the pitch. I have been hearing his name alot the past few months. I would like to hear his vision, even though I am rather skeptical of a hedge fund manager with an oil background having all the solutions to our problems today.

"Pickens is the founder and chairman of BP, beyond petroleum."

Pickens is the founder and chairman of BP Energy fund, a hedge fund started in 1997 who now is called BP Capital. He has nothing to do with BP (formerly british petroleum, now just BP, who markets with a beyond petroleum message.) The BP roots in America go back to what was originally standard oil pre 1900.

Scotta, out of curiosity, what is your definition of "gone broke years ago"? Is being 7 trillion negative on a federal level and 2.5 trillion negative on a consumer level broke?

Anyway, I have heard what you described before and some aspects of it certainly ring true. The general system is called petrodollars. Oil is priced in dollars so the rest of the world must get dollars to purchase oil, this keeps dollars in demand. In return for us buying their oil, they take those dollars and spend them buying US debt. It's what allows us to keep on keeping on for the last several decades. Now that our dollar is devaluing, there is talk of buying and selling oil in yen, euros, and Iran has even said gold maybe. I'm just saying that just because something has held a pattern in the past does not mean it will continue to do so. I think some things have already began to shift.

"The money doesn't flow one way.." ? I think you should see where that money is going.
http://www.dubai-architecture.info/DUB-GAL1.htm

ScottA · July 22, 2008, 10:42:00 PM

Broke = no money. Don't have any. Can't borrow any.

How much money has been spent on oil over the last 30 years by Americans? Sure the Arabs are getting rich but they are also buying up our debt which generates cash flow. I doubt much of that debt will ever get paid off and it is devaluing daily due to inflation. If the Arabs stopped buying our debt they'd all be invaded or we'd stop buying their oil. I wonder how much debt Iran has bought lately? How much was Iraq buying before we invaded?

desdawg · July 22, 2008, 10:58:51 PM

I guess I only got the BP part and related it to what I had heard of. I guess BP in his case probably stands for Boone Pickens. I have been hearing his name a lot lately too mainly on paid spot advertising if I am not mistaken. His pitch sounded right and I may still write him in as salesman of the year. One of the senators mentioned that the people we are supporting out of country buy up a lot of our debt. So that did come up during the spiel. I saw it on C-Span, don't know if it will air again. What also came up was the fact that NG is used a lot by the chemical industry and they would have to compete to fill their needs. I believe it was called feed stock for some processes. I don't know enough about it to understand the significance.

July 23, 2008, 08:14:09 AM

NG is used to make fertilizer.

desdawg · July 23, 2008, 08:16:45 AM

It is also used to make electricity in some cases I guess.

desdawg · July 23, 2008, 12:01:10 PM

There are so many stories out there that it becomes hard to sort the wheat from the chaf. The rumor mill is pretty prolific. I think some of the low producing wells are being re-worked with newer technology but that costs time and money. No quick fixes there.