Mozambique is set to expand its natural gas industry so the African country can reduce its dependence on petroleum. The country wants to power cars using its natural gas reserves, which the BBC says are estimated at 3.6 trillion cubit feet in one province.
Sounds a LITTLE bit like the “Pickens Plan”: the billionaire is calling for increased wind energy for electricity and a transfer of natural gas assets to cars.
Facebook IS international these days …
–John
By John Sutter
Billionaire oil tycoon turned alt. energy advocate T. Boone Pickens took his wind power advocacy to a whole new level this week with a public relations campaign he’s calling the “Pickens Plan.”
Check out the video above. You’ll see Pickens go into teacher mode as he draws on a marker board and talks over graphs about our nation’s energy usage. His plan would involved a $1 trillion government investment in wind energy. That would enable the country to produce 22 percent its electricity from wind, freeing up natural gas for use in automobiles. Bada bing! Less dependence on foreign oil, he says.
Of course, Pickens stands to benefit from such a proposition. As The Guardian points out, he’s invested $12 billion on a wind farm in the Texas Panhandle. Compared to that number, the price of his “Pickens Plan” campaign seems small: $58 million, reportedly.
The PR blitz is all over the internet. Pickens has set up a Facebook page, a YouTube channel and there’s an entire Web site devoted to his plan.
In interviews with other news media, Pickens has said his advocacy for wind power is not motivated purely by profit. Environmental groups seem to be loving his stances.
What do you all think?
(Here’s a good analysis of how other media are covering this story, from the Knight Science Journalism Tracker)
By John Sutter
Couple of interesting articles on T. Boone Pickens. He’s got more on his plate than predicting oil prices and writing fat checks to Oklahoma State.
First, from Business Week, a story about his water rights purchases in Texas:
If water is the new oil, T. Boone Pickens is a modern-day John D. Rockefeller. Pickens owns more water than any other individual in the U.S. and is looking to control even more. He hopes to sell the water he already has, some 65 billion gallons a year, to Dallas, transporting it over 250 miles, 11 counties, and about 650 tracts of private property.
Then, from a WSJ blog, more on wind power debates in Congress. The “choicest remarks” in the debate came from Pickens, the blog reports. Pickens owns the world’s largest wind farm, located in the Texas Panhandle:
If we take the natural gas we’re using for electrical generation and move it to transportation, we can replace 38 percent of our foreign oil imports. And that, sports fans, is a real number. (Pickens)
