OUR OPINION: Pickens cooking with natural gas
OUR OPINION: Pickens cooking with natural gas
Texas oilman and entrepreneur T. Boone Pickens wouldn’t be spending millions of dollars promoting an energy plan if it weren’t likely to benefit him. That doesn’t mean his push to greatly increase the use of natural gas to power vehicles is a bad idea, though.
In fact, it makes great sense — if he can manage to change the way politicians and motorists think about they way vehicles are fueled and then create a system for delivering what they need, hardly a simple task.
Pickens didn’t become wealthy keeping his head in the clouds, so he proposes a bite-size approach. He is asking Congress to pass legislation funding a pilot program to switch 350,000 large trucks from diesel to natural gas.
The obstacles are significant. One is the cost — $75,000 per vehicle. Another is not enough fueling stations exist — only about 1,500 in the entire country, compared to about 200,000 gasoline stations, although the legislation would offer tax incentives that presumably increase the number of refueling places.
On the other hand, the potential payoff is enormous. Pickens says switching just those 350,000 trucks to natural gas would reduce foreign oil imports by more than 5 percent. Also, natural gas burns 50 percent cleaner than oil.
Put those facts together and, if the nation could move far enough in that direction, we would make a big dent in two long-standing concerns: overdependence on foreign oil and climate damage. Another benefit is jobs — about 455,000 just in the heavy-duty truck conversion program, by Pickens’ calculations. Too, while natural gas vehicles cost more, they are more cost-efficient over time.
Like oil, natural gas is finite and thus not a permanent solution, but there’s a big enough supply that no one living today would have to worry about it disappearing. Pickens estimates there’s at least a 100-year supply, and much of it is in the United States.
And much of that is in Texas, which began well over a decade ago converting state-owned vehicles to natural gas and now has a program encouraging cities, counties and other entities to run their fleets on natural gas.
The Texas General Land Office has a $5 million grant program to encourage cities to make the switch with their garbage trucks and street sweepers. The city of Dallas has more than 1,200 natural gas vehicles. San Antonio’s riverboats have changed to natural gas.
Pickens’ proposal is expensive — he asked Congress for $28 billion — but it has a sizable payoff. It’s one of the simplest ways to reduce toxic emissions, and it can set the pace for a broader conversion that would greatly reduce reliance on imported oil. Pickens has a lot of ducks to line up. We wish him well.
Buck
Texas oilman and entrepreneur T. Boone Pickens wouldn’t be spending millions of dollars promoting an energy plan if it weren’t likely to benefit him. That doesn’t mean his push to greatly increase the use of natural gas to power vehicles is a bad idea, though.
In fact, it makes great sense — if he can manage to change the way politicians and motorists think about they way vehicles are fueled and then create a system for delivering what they need, hardly a simple task.
Pickens didn’t become wealthy keeping his head in the clouds, so he proposes a bite-size approach. He is asking Congress to pass legislation funding a pilot program to switch 350,000 large trucks from diesel to natural gas.
The obstacles are significant. One is the cost — $75,000 per vehicle. Another is not enough fueling stations exist — only about 1,500 in the entire country, compared to about 200,000 gasoline stations, although the legislation would offer tax incentives that presumably increase the number of refueling places.
On the other hand, the potential payoff is enormous. Pickens says switching just those 350,000 trucks to natural gas would reduce foreign oil imports by more than 5 percent. Also, natural gas burns 50 percent cleaner than oil.
Put those facts together and, if the nation could move far enough in that direction, we would make a big dent in two long-standing concerns: overdependence on foreign oil and climate damage. Another benefit is jobs — about 455,000 just in the heavy-duty truck conversion program, by Pickens’ calculations. Too, while natural gas vehicles cost more, they are more cost-efficient over time.
Like oil, natural gas is finite and thus not a permanent solution, but there’s a big enough supply that no one living today would have to worry about it disappearing. Pickens estimates there’s at least a 100-year supply, and much of it is in the United States.
And much of that is in Texas, which began well over a decade ago converting state-owned vehicles to natural gas and now has a program encouraging cities, counties and other entities to run their fleets on natural gas.
The Texas General Land Office has a $5 million grant program to encourage cities to make the switch with their garbage trucks and street sweepers. The city of Dallas has more than 1,200 natural gas vehicles. San Antonio’s riverboats have changed to natural gas.
Pickens’ proposal is expensive — he asked Congress for $28 billion — but it has a sizable payoff. It’s one of the simplest ways to reduce toxic emissions, and it can set the pace for a broader conversion that would greatly reduce reliance on imported oil. Pickens has a lot of ducks to line up. We wish him well.
Buck
Views: 49
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by jffree1 on
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Boone Pickens is my hero. I just hope he lives to be 100. And I don't care if he makes money because he is putting his money where his mouth is.
I've seen articles about what some Texas cities are doing with Natural Gas but I haven't seen anything about Houston. Someone tell me what's going on in big H re: ng for city transportation... anything?
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Permalink Reply by LP on -
Buck,
Where was this article published ? Or did you write it?
More and more the light of knowledge is being switched on. And the power behind that light switch is..natural gas.
I keep trying to explain to my friends that dependence on foreign oil is totally a matter of our chosing to be dependent and that we have a real, true, practical option that is available to us right now. We never more need to fear disaster if the middle east should cut off our supply of oil. Needless to say, these friends are not local or they would already be in the know.
Slowly they are beginning to understand.
Articles such as this help.
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Permalink Reply by LP on
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Buck,
My question was regarding the article titled: OUR OPINION: Pickens cooking with natural gas
Where was that article published and who wrote it? What is the link to it?
Thanks
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Permalink Reply by Bill Shaefer on -
I think you can read the Dallas Morning News on line. This morning's edition of the newspaper had an article about natural gas powered cars and how a Dallas company is converting 8,000 AT&T vehicles to ng. The only thing the article didn't say is how much it costs to convert a car or pickup.
I read another article that implied that Haynesville drilling is slowing down because of lower gas prices. is there a reliable source that I can access that tracks weekly Haynesville rig counts. The last number I saw was in an Encana presentation that said 75 (I think) rigs were running in Haynesville.
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Bill, You can find that info on the Baker-Hughes website. It is updated every Friday I was told.
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Permalink Reply by Les Bamburg on
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Jffree, the BH website does not provide specific information for the Haynesville Shale drilling. On the other hand you can check the comments for the following Group for weekly updates related to Haynesville Shale drilling.
http://haynesvilleshale.ning.com/group/drillingriglocations
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Permalink Reply by Spring Branch,mineral owner on
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85 rigs drilling in the Haynesville of NW Louisiana per the Shreveport Times for the week ended 7/24/2009. Seems to me to be speeding up, not slowing down in the Haynesville Shale.
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Permalink Reply by Parkdota on
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They're definitely speeding up as to keep land/mineral rights that they've already acquired. On my land they were going to drill 4 wells but are only doing 1 now. So, it's growing but not as much as it would have if things weren't so tough on prices and the economy. Encana's recent call in said that they are going for 50 more rigs this year and 75 or 100 next year...all in the Haynesville Shale. Other areas are having rig shut downs....but not here.
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Permalink Reply by Les Bamburg on
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Logan, that was 50 net wells - not drilling rigs.
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Permalink Reply by Les Bamburg on
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SB, it is unlikely the Shreveport Times knows specifically how many drillig rigs are on Haynesville Shale wells. The 85 seems high and is probably the total of all drilling rigs in Northwest Louisiana.
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