“We have made up our minds on this issue. Don’t expect any discussion or evaluation from us. Our allegiance is to our energy advertisers: seen all those car ads?, oil company ads? even the latest coal industry ads? Hell those bring in big money to us, so we have to work to support their industry.”

“We are especially thrilled that T. Boone has kept his hands off coal. Now if he can only spend advertisement dollars with us.”

Thanks Matt Damon for the great report. Stick with the Internet, Cable TV is biased.

My husband and I spent $10,000 upgrading our windows, insulation, and doors and received $500 tax break.

Having a plan is worse than useless if it is the wrong plan.

One reason Joe has identified plug-ins as the transportation fuel of choice is precisely for the reason you identify: it can be be produced by methods appropriate to each locality. It is the ultimate flex-fuel.

I wouldn’t rule out natural gas powered vehicles (despite also thinking they are no solution). “Constituency cost” effects in the minds of politicians will be significant. CNG and LPG are operationally quite close to liquid fuels — same infrastructure of fuel tanks, mechanical workshops, lubricants, catalytic converters. In voter terms: tanker drivers, mechanics, exhaust and cooling system manufacturers. Low constituency cost. Electric vehicles don’t need the same infrastructure, they need a different one; there will be much wailing about threatened livelihoods. High constituency cost. That easily trumps any geeky argument about thermal efficiency. So it’s at least possible some-one will propose NG, and be listened to.

Given the large discount gas is trading at compared to oil (per Joule), I am just glad no one has (yet) suggested building synfuel plants using natural gas as a feedstock. We in NZ did this back in the 70s, after finding a big gas field. Happily, it was put out of business by the crash in oil prices in the 80s. Fingers crossed, let’s hope no-one does _that_ again. But electric vehicles bring their own problems.

Running _one_ car on electricity does reduce GHG emissions, yes. Converting the vehicle fleet wholesale over to electric power creates a few problems, though. The main one is the need to more than double generating and grid capacity. The conventional wisdom is that 20% is wind+solar+wave power’s limit in the generating mix, without destabilising the grid. Since everyone will be in a hurry, the other 80% will be the easiest-to-build technology: coal and gas powered steam turbines. (Despite the existence of, for example, solar thermal plants.)

Re the TV station: you’re doing the right thing: Bravo! Keep pushing the message that sound-bite “solutions” won’t cut it. We need to be adults now.

You are also probably unaware that PHEVs are well suited to being charged by wind and solar, and that they can potentially raise the grid percentage of these technologies to 50% via V2G (google it).

We’re toast…

The idea is to go much farther than what T Boone Pickens wants. And to have the nuclear replace all the coal for electricity-generation. And for the coal to be liquified using hydrogen generated via off-peak nuclear power.

This idea is bolstered by the quest others, such as Honda, have embarked on to develop hydrogen powered fuel cells. Why bother with a fuel cell if a battery will work? I don’t know enough about the science to really understand this, but if Honda is pursuing fuel cells then I too have my doubts as they seem to be ahead of the curve for the most part.

Battery power, in my mind, is equated with photovoltaic cells. It seems they will never be good enough to get the job done. Please convince me otherwise.

Myself, I want to drive one of those cars with a compressed air powered engine. That is just too cool. I’m right now contemplating how I can hook my dog up to a squirrel cage-type generator so she can run a compressor to power up my air drive car while I’m sleeping.

Did you read Tom G’s post immediately before yours?

The recharging of autos would be done largely at night, when other load factors are low… And Night is often when wind power is at its peak.

If this is what he believes, it is even more foolish. To make two fuel transitions in the vehicle fleet is really asking too much. PHEVs are really only half a transition, since they are compatible with existing fleet infrastructure, and the existing new fleet infrastructure (the grid).

Moreover, hydrogen is a wasteful fuel. Today a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle has about the same greenhouse pollution per mile as a Prius (using NREL’s 11,888 gCO2/kgH2 estimate for steam reformation of methane). You can make hydrogen from renewable electricity by electrolysis. Today it takes 3-4x the electricity per mile to drive this way. If all of the aggressive goals for electrolysis and fuel cell efficiency are met someday, then it will still take twice as much electricity (i.e. twice as many square miles of mirrors or turbines) as driving directly on electricity.

Joe’s post explicitly said, “plug-in hybrids”, so why are you changing the subject to pure battery electric vehicles? Do you know understand that a plug-in hybrid (PHEV) can replace gasoline as a fuel with electricity for some large fraction of its miles using a small battery pack and no compromises on range or functionality? A PHEV with 20 miles of electric range (a PHEV-20) will cut gasoline usage in half, according to statistics gathered by the Federal government. PHEV-40s would reduce gasoline consumption by approximately 70%.

Andy says, “Battery power, in my mind, is equated with photovoltaic cells. It seems they will never be good enough to get the job done. Please convince me otherwise.”

Absence of proof is not proof of absence, especially when the absence is simply ignorance. Battery technology is adequate (it could be better, but it has been good enough for a while). We have a 2002 Toyota RAV4-EV in our garage. In six years we have put over 80,000 miles on it. The range is 100 miles, and provides the bulk of our annual miles. Without an internal combustion engine, radiator, alternator, spark plugs, air filter, oil filter, oil changes, belts, carburetor, catalytic converter, muffler, or transmission, it is extremely reliable (the electric motor is probably good for a million miles). The batteries will probably last 150,000 miles. It uses 1990s battery technology (NiMH). This suggests that 1990s batteries are good enough (too bad Chevron won’t let Panasonic sell them for use in the U.S.) Modern Lithium batteries are much better (not laptop/cellphone batteries, but ones designed for safety and lifetime), and aren’t blocked by an oil company.

Andy Says, “Myself, I want to drive one of those cars with a compressed air powered engine. That is just too cool. I’m right now contemplating how I can hook my dog up to a squirrel cage-type generator so she can run a compressor to power up my air drive car while I’m sleeping.”

This was probably an attempt at humor; if not you just proved you are clueless.

On what basis do you make this claim. When I crunch the numbers, PHEV-20s save the consumer money.

Graeme Bird says, “Pickens has his eye on the ball. Even if batteries were that good we don’t have the nuclear output to justify these cars yet.”

Nuclear is about the second or third worst choice for fueling PHEVs. Wind is a very good choice; it is much cheaper and variable power levels are not an issue.

Is “ain’t so bad” the standard we require? The greenhouse pollution from steam-reformation of natural gas to power a FCV is essentially the same as from driving a Prius on gasoline. Why would we wait 20 years for FCVs, only to make zero progress?

The attempt on the part of big oil companies to latch on to more land while they’ve got a couple of friends in the White House. That would be in addition to the tens of millions of acres that they have access to now and aren’t using.

They tacked on some pocket change for plug-in, etc. I would imagine. Noting serious, but gives them a talking point when they next run for office….

Being an oil man means he and his company are close to natural gas production and his company may have drilled and sold natural gas, I don’t know. And he is an advocate that we are at peak oil. So it is natural that he should think that something he knows about is the solution to these problems. If he made his money in batteries, he might have thought that would be the solution.

Which all goes to a comment about how we solve our problems, with what we know. If all we have is a hammer, all the world looks like a nail. If you’re a success at drilling into the ground and selling what comes out for billions of dollars, that must be what will solve our problems.

But as the article above shows, the efficiencies of Picken’s proposals are not as good as other possible solutions. As a celebrity, (and the millions to spend for advertising) Pickens gets the publicity being on news and entertainment shows.

To really solve the energy problems and to inform ourselves of how to solve the problems, we should be listening to the engineers who are best able to explain the possible solutions and the better solutions. But we have celebrity millionaires on our news shows. When there was the invasion of Afganistan and Iraq, at least we had military generals on the talk shows. But I haven’t seen any engineers on talk and news shows discussing this. Maybe engineers and those who would be able to explain things better are to boring. Much better to review what clothes the Presidntial candidates spouces wear or other trival things. No wonder we don’t get public support behind solutions to our energy problems. We haven’t yet as a country learned how to talk effectively about our energy problems.

Look at what Pickens is actually doing. He’s putting his money where his mouth is - a lot of money, all going to wind. He’s spent $2 billion and expects to spend $10 billion.

Look at what he’s SAYING about natural gas and vehicles. He talks it up, sure, with ambitious targets. He says that in ten years there might be enough wind to make a substitution, that there’ll be more CNG cars available in three.

But look more closely at what he’s DOING about natural gas and vehicles. Very little! A few millions on R&D seed money, a few man hours on sketching out his ambitious plans. He’s too smart to invest substantial amounts in this before there’s more certainty it could work. It’s a paper plan, not a real endeavour.

For all the talk, what he’s actually doing is heavily - very heavily - skewed towards wind. Personally I can therefore forgive him his investment in R&D, even though Joe’s analysis of why it’s a wrong turn makes perfect sense. What he’s doing in reality is excellent even though what he’s doing in his dreams is a bit misguided.

I think he deserves a lot more praise!

Yes, don’t you just hate it when Earl brings up inconvenient things like facts? If your only approach is to malign his character, rather than having a rational counter-argument, we have to assume he is correct in his analysis.

Because he has a different goal than you — reducing our dependence on foreign oil, rather than reducing green house emissions. Yes, some of the same strategies can be used to achieve both goals, but replacing coal with wind does nothing to solve Pickens’ goal.

He calls natural gas “cheap” and “abundant” — is is neither.

Internal combustion engines are in efficient, electric motors are efficient. His ideas makes no sense on efficiency grounds.

Did you read Tom G’s post immediately before yours?

The recharging of autos would be done largely at night, when other load factors are low… And Night is often when wind power is at its peak.”

No good. You are thinking of the prototype alone. You are not thinking about the suppliers and the suppliers suppliers and their suppliers and the whole supply chain.

And attempt to go for batteries too fast will lead to cost blowouts.

Far better is the research project for the air-car. There all you have is a compressor that can perfectly combust diesel. But that otherwise is as small as possible. And carbon-fibre tanks. It becomes immediately obvious that mass-production won’t lead to cost blowouts in the same way as all this battery production and stuff. And of course you would have the off-peak electricity compressor. The research project is greatly simplified and there is no obvious component that could be subject to cost blowouts under mass-production.

Hence you have the possibility for a sort of Moores Law equivalent to get under way.

You know if things are done right you would have your high performance liquified-coal vehicle. But you would still buy an air-car and leave the flasher vehicle in the garage most of the time to cut costs.

The deal with the air-car is you are not getting the extra energy usage of latent power. Since a fairly small compressor running a lot of the time could pretty much serve for nearly any vehicle.

We do have working all-electric cars on the road right now.

As for nuclear - it’s most likely toast. Notice how much private money is being invested in new nuclear? (Here’s a hint: Zero.)

PV Solar and Thermal solar is positioned to take away the most profitable part of the power market, peak hour sales. Without that very high wholesale return there is probably no way that nuclear can recover it’s startup costs.

We can get new solar of both types up and running in a very few years vs. a decade or two for new nuclear. Anyone considering spending billions today to bring nuclear to the market in 10-20 years is going to have to wonder if there will be any good paying market left for them.

if you want to learn more about peak oil/the energy side of things: http://theoildrum.com

http://www.businessweek.com/ magazine/ content/ 08_25/ b4089040017753.htm

his wind turbine farm plan actually concerns water. He thinks that is where the real money will be in the future.

Of course more nuclear needs to be started right away. But even a single plant takes about ten years. To have scores of them will take a bit longer. But pickens reckons they can exploit the wind corridor in less than ten years.

You’ve got to roll these things out in the right profitable order.

Number one use of imported oil is for transportation. Any way that can be displaced is a good thing.

Paying attention to what T. Boone Pickens says is an opinion from someone who is at least an expert on the current situation. He will make money no matter what the future is for energy generation.

ALL cards need to be on the table!

But I support the “Pickens Plan” 100% because I know the brillant 50% will succeed and the stupid 50% will fail.

The good part–building out the windpower infrastructure–happens first, and happens with Pickens’ dough, only requiring a bit of government and industry cooperation. Solar thermal is a great idea too, and it’s encouraging that Pickens mentioned it, even if he’s not investing in it now.

The stupid part is switching from one fossil fuel to another. According to Pickens, this part happens next, and happens as a matter of consumer choice (i.e. we all decide to go out and buy natural gas cars or pay to have existing cars converted).

But this will never happen, due to two magic words that right-wing nutjobs have endless faith in, except when it comes to energy. Those two words are “free market”.

Anybody check the price of natural gas these days? It ain’t any cheaper than oil, and if we go from 100K to 1Million natural gas vehicles in this country, it ain’t gonna get any cheaper either. Why do I need to go buy a new car or pay money to have my existing one converted to natural gas, when IT WON’T SAVE ME ANY MONEY??

On a side note, somebody also tell me why power utilities would shutter their new, expensive, efficient natural gas generator plants, especially when those plants are perfect for the job of load balancing with wind power (i.e. the wind doesn’t blow all the time, so you need a reserve capacity that can come online QUICKLY–coal and nuke are too slow to ramp up, only hydro and natural gas really fit the bill here).

So, sure, I support Pickens’ plan 100%. It’s painless, as the stupid part will fail–just don’t tell him that. By the time he’s dead or senile we’ll all have electric cars anyway.

(And if you want to know when we get back to $20 oil, well dangit, can’t you read? The National Review has told us for the past 5 years that we’ll be back to cheap oil in about 6 months. Sheesh. Some people never learn.)

You probably do, however, have a point about the arbitrage of NG–out of the power generation grid, to then use in cars as being inefficient. But what you miss are the positive externalities of building out the Grid in such a massive way, as Picken’s proposes. In other words, you and I would be better off advocating for the plan, because the Grid buildout would unfold first and more quickly than the switchover to NG cars.

Finally I think the threshold has been crossed now, and naysayers carry some modest burden to formulate plans. At least Pickens is not an Oil Shale Clown, saying we can easily recover kerogen from Rocky Mtn Shale. I mean that is a big leap forward from the current duscission.

Also, we need to drill for more NG and Oil. Not that it will do anything for price. But rather, we need to monetize it and use the royalites 100% for public transport.

Finally, I see no solution outside of public transport, running off electricity. that means the Grid needs to be expanded–both the inputs and the network. So again, this gets back to the PickensPlan.

Bottom line: it’s really not about NG cars. It’s about creating a better grid.

Gregor

The Pickens Plan is only 1 part stoopid to 2 parts brilliant, not 50/50 as I had supposed.

The two brilliant parts are one, windpower and two, BUILDING OUT THE GRID!! That’s kind of a stealth point that barely gets a mention on Pickens’ whiteboard, but as Gregor points out, it may be the most important part of it all, as windmills can only be used for windpower, but a better grid can be used for ANY source of electricity.

The answer: you should first light the match.

So the first thing we need to do is build out the grid. That’s necessary whatever path we take to energy security and sustainability.

I’ve been wondering why the proposed concentrated solar plants will take up so much space? I think the Bureau of Land Management is reviewing something like a 120 permit applications that are seeking permission to utilize over a million acres of federal lands. That would be what, 8,500 acres per plant or an area about 3.5 miles square for each installation? Is most of this empty space between facilities or what?

We need to do all of it and do it ALL NOW!

The winner’s of the Energy Independence Battle will eventually come to the forefront in about 20 Years.

TAKE DECISIVE ACTION NOW on Energy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What is Decisive Action?

Well… the ONLY Action that will get us out of this mess… The Dependence on Foreign Oil that is and will continue to DESTROY our Economy and Country. Plus HIGH and going HIGHER ENERGY PRICES is to…

DO EVERYTHING NOW! EVERYTHING!!!!!! RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!!

Conservation – Important part… but will NOT solve Problem by itself!

Open UP all Areas NOW off limits to OIL DRILLING and I mean ALL: Deep water Continental Shelf, Anwar and Shale!

DRILL… DRILL… DRILL… for OIL and NATURAL GAS in an environmentally safe way! This can be done safely… it is done safely everywhere else in the World! In Fact China will soon drill off our coast… thanks to Cuba.

Develop Clean COAL Technology and other coal technologies

Biofuels.. all forms should move forward… NOT just Corn.

WIND

Hybrid’s Auto’s and Natural Gas Auto’s. All types of hybrid’s should be pursued!

SOLAR

HYDRO

NUCULAR – Why haven’t we built a Nuclear Power Plant in the last 30 Years??? Why??? Ask you local representatives… Why??? Who Blocks this clean, cheap energy??? Who???

Other New Energy sources… yet to be found.

The Government should Take ALL the Barriers out of the way for every Idea to move forward FAST!!!!! GOVERNMENT and POLITICIANS get out of the way NOW!!!!!!!

We ALL need to force our elected representatives to take ACTION NOW on ALL Forms of Energy Sources!

Read How on this webpage: www.jdsannuities.com/_5__gas___help

or copy and paste this link to your address bar: http://www.jdsannuities.com/_5__gas___help

Is $4.00++ per Gallon Gasoline KILLING your Budget?
Have your Electric Bills gone UP materially so far this summer?
Wait until you see your Heating Bills this Winter!!!!!!

We the People will be heard!

> DRILL… DRILL… DRILL… for OIL and NATURAL GAS in an environmentally safe way! This can be done safely… it is done safely everywhere else in the World! In Fact China will soon drill off our coast… thanks to Cuba.

This is nuts. The same business as usual, head in the sand approach. Contributes to Global Warming, doesn’t help us move toward carbon neutral renewable resources.

Where did you get nonsense such as the above? NGCC can be as high as 60% (you got one thing right), e.g. the GE H-System turbine. The grid delivers that power to you at about 93% efficiency. (Source: wikipedia: “Transmission and distribution losses in the USA were estimated at 7.2% in 1995″). So now you’re down to 55.7% at your plug, not the laughable 33% you said. For converting from AC to DC, use 92%. For charging/discharging batteries, it varies a lot by battery chemistry. Lithium-Ion is quite good in this regard (NiMH less good). One could again use 92%. Thus the NG to motor pathway is something like 47% efficient. The efficiency of burning NG in an internal combustion engine is nowhere near this figure. The Honda Civic CNG only gets 28 MPG (converting NG energy to its gasoline gallon equivalent) according to the EPA.

The short term solution is as follows:

1) Conservation - High prices will push conservation, but we need to quit believing that oil prices are going to go back under $100 per barrel. All the sub-$100 oil has been produced…all that is left is post-$100. We also can not simply sit back and hope that technology bails us out. Technology will come but it will take a whole lot of money and will take whole lot of time. In the meantime we need to conserve and use less energy.

2) Diversify - We are totally depend on oil for transportation. Instead of blaming everybody(energy traders, the Middle East, George Bush, major oil companies, etc.) we must diversify so that we have alternatives. Natural gas vehicles in the short term is the only meaningful solution and technology is already here and working. Electric cars and hybrids are good too but they are still years away before they can be meaningful.

3) Domestic - The rest of the world doesn’t care about the U.S. and we have relied on others for too much of our energy needs. The U.S. has the third largest natural gas reserves of any country in the world. We have already produced almost all of our oil. Natural gas is MUCH MUCH cleaner than coal and oil, is currently trading at half the price of oil and is domestic. We must convert our transportation system to natural gas in the short term while we figure out the long term solution.

The big issue now is that Washington is looking for someone to blame and not looking for solutions. Neither Obama nor McClain have a clue as how to solve these issues. All I hear is a windfall profits tax. That is a joke…it didn’t work before and will only make matters worse. The U.S. goverment has no impact on oil prices other than to make them go up more than they already have. The only way is for every American to tell Washington to get the smartest energy people up to Capital Hill and figure out a short term plan and a long term plan. At least Pickens put out a plan that is “commercial”, the technology is already developed and doesn’t require other countries to help us out. And you know what he doesn’t blame the past 60 years of politicians and us(we elected them) for having NO energy policy. He is an 80 old dude who is looking to the future. We should take a lesson and do the same.

John

What is not beyond me is that at the current price per barrel there will be those within the oil industry who will insist we can burn oil for years and years, and in fact, there are those saying just that now.

What is not beyond me is that with carbon measurements in the atmosphere approaching 340 ppm and climbing, “carbon neutrality” does not seem to ensure the possibility of survival for the species of humanity in the long term.

What is not beyond me is that republicans who insist on doing nothing unless and until the Chinese and Indian governments can be brought along are the same individuals who would chose to sustain the current economic model regardless of the consequences. They are precisely the kind of individuals who coin terms like “externality” in an effort to eschew the consequences for their own behavior and that of their friends and ideological soulmates - all in the name of Profit.

What is not beyond me is that the ship is sinking, though the cant of the deck is as yet barely perceptable. Those of us in steerage are not yet locked below decks.

Why is no one talking about the possibility of going ‘carbon negative’?

Why is Bush/Cheney advocating a five fold increase in logging in Tsongas?

https://secure.defenders.org/ site/ Advocacy?pagename=homepage&page=UserAction&id=1133&autologin=true&s_einterest=C3C4

WTF i say, WTF . . .

An Australian company just passed on leasing Texas land for a wind farm. The reason: It wasn’t economically feasible to built wind turbines and make money at the same. TBP needs federal and state money to finance his dream, so his company can build the wind farms and make billions in profits. This guy is running a scam!

I can speak for this locality in this way. During the summer months during peak power use hours the grid here locally will be at maximum capacity and the light on the board goes red.

What does this mean, dont even think about sneezing and tripping the generating unit.

Peak hours are from around 9am to 3pm M - F.

Not saying that adding plug in’s will take out the grid here.

ComEd implements a plan were you save a few bucks on your electric bill to allow them to shut off your a/c at home when the demand is high on the grid.

There hasnt been much added to the grid here locally except a few combined cycle gas turbine units. And a few of them companies went bankrupt with the price of natural gas increasing.

Lets not forget that Midwest generation eliminated around 2500MWH’s by demolishing and leveling the Collins Generation Station in Morris IL due to the fact that a high tax rate in Grundy County caused the company to shut the doors there. All of the equipment was either sold off or scrapped out to China.

There will need to be generation added to certain urban centers where the population growth and demand require it. Some locals can use wind, where it is available use it. Others can use a hydro unit do that where its feasible also. And others will require nuclear build it.

Lets be realistic there is no one “genie in a bottle” to cure the situation we are in. This will have to be a systematic approach applied.

To make this issue political is simply childish.

We are Americans and we live in the best country in this world period.

I think TBP has a great plan that starts the ball rolling can we do better probably……….but what are we doing today that is better than his proposed plan? We are typing away on this thread and doing nothing that is what we are doing.

There is a call of action and duty for the country to start the journey.

Lets get to work America.

PJ said, “Lets be realistic there is no one “genie in a bottle” to cure the situation we are in.”

That’s why Joe identified 14 wedges to address global warming, not 1 wedge. See http://climateprogress.org/ 2008/ 04/ 22/ is-450-ppm-or-less-politically-possible-part-2-the-solution/
for details.

People are. See James Hansen’s work and also http://350.org/