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November 7, 2008 at 03:47:26
Pickens Plan: Boon or Boondoggle? by Barry Krusch Page 1 of 1 page(s) |
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Written by Kat Bundy and Barry Krusch 
According to the U.S. Department of Energy, marketed production of natural gas in the United States has already begun to fall.We currently import 19 percent of the natural gas we consumeOutside of the United States, Russia, Iran, and Qatar have the largest reserves, 27%, 16%, and 15% respectively. Transitioning to natural gas dependency will only continue our current reliance upon world markets and other countries' gas supplies. And we cannot safely assume that Russia and Iran will become our economic allies. Its import from other countries would turn our ports into potential flash points. To be shipped, natural gas must first be liquefied, then shipped in specially designed containers to ports that are equipped to handle the dangerous material. It must then heated back to its gaseous state.
Another danger of dependency upon natural gas is this: Colin Campbell, geologist and founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas (ASPO), reports that natural gas supplies will drop precipitously after a plateau, as if dropping off a cliff, unlike the steady decline of oil.This "cliff" is predicted to occur somewhere between 2010 and 2020. So you could say that we're close enough to the edge to peer over into the abyss. What then?
As Pickens claims on his website at www.pickensplan.com/theplan, natural gas is 30% cleaner than gasoline. But this means that automobiles powered by natural gas still emit 70% of the CO2 emitted by internal combustion engines. And considering the enormous infrastructure that would need to be implemented to handle the switch to natural gas-including fueling stations and new cars-the cost becomes an unnecessary, even dangerous, burden. Perhaps more importantly, is it worth the time (that is rapidly diminishing) to switch? It would cost approximately $4 to $5 trillion to replace 200 million vehicles at $20,000 per vehicle.
As far as the infrastructure necessary for the massive transition to natural gas cars, the Pickens Plan fails to address what to do with the country's extensive electrical infrastructure currently in place. Why not feed wind power to the grid? With PHEV-40 vehicles (plug-in hybrid electric), which travel 40 miles on one charge, and standard electric cars, the wind-energy infrastructure could power automobiles through the electrical grid and reduce gas consumption from 50% to 70%.
In the U.S. Department of Energy's report, 20% Wind Energy by 2030, Based on the EIA's goal of 20% Wind Scenario-wind generating 20% of U.S. electricity needs-wind turbines would supply almost 1.16 billion MWh (megawatt hours) by 2030, displacing nearly 50% of gas consumption through electric utilities and 11% of the country's overall demand for natural gas. Therefore, let the gas continue to be used for purposes it has been serving, such as for industrial uses (metals preheating, waste treatment, glass melting) and commercial uses (cooling and cooking), as well as for manufacturing certain products and chemicals.
The Pickens Plan's focus on enormous electric grids would also exacerbate our already centralized methods of power generation at the expense of distributed power generation (such as solar thermal and photovoltaic), which is located at the point of contact at the home. Solar thermal power can displace electricity for heating water and can instead be used to charge electric cars. Such distributed power generation is also much less vulnerable than large centralized plants.
The problem with the Pickens Plan is that there is too much Pickens and not enough Plan. It is a simple approach, but the simplicity leaves many gaps. A plan is comprehensive and detailed, and incorporates an array of approaches, with deadlines and milestones. It contains the analytic data that shows that future energy needs can be met at the lowest possible cost: the Pickens Plan does not do this. Because it is not actually a comprehensive plan, the Pickens approach omits a whole host of cost-effective options, including moving businesses to telecommuting, reducing the workweek for those businesses creating carpooling software, intellitaxis, car sharing, movement to alternative vehicle types such as electric motorcycles, etc. Furthermore, the Pickens Plan does not address societal inefficiencies (i.e. magnet schools with kids coming from miles away, lack of HOV lanes, high schools which allow kids to park increasing auto use, businesses which operate in 5 day workweeks when only 4 are required, business which don't offer telecommuting, etc). These inefficiencies add enormous costs, and addressing these inefficiencies will be not only be cheaper but will achieve the desired result of displacing gasoline consumption more quickly.
Pickens himself outlined parameters of legitimacy for other plans. In a news release, Pickens stated the following:
''I believe that elements of any realistic plan to reduce our deadly addiction to foreign oil should encompass the following:-
- Will it slash oil imports by at least 30% in 10 years?-
- Does it rely 100% on domestic energy resources?-
- Does it rely on existing and proven technologies?-
- Can it be on line within 10 years?-
- Can it be done by private investment?''
There are at least 3 other plans that meet these criteria (and many other criteria that Pickens did not list). The first is Plan B, formulated by Lester Brown, which pools conservation with a movement to alternate energy sources. The second is Plan C, by Pat Murphy, which posits as a solution a form of extreme conservation that he refers to as curtailment. And then there is a third plan proposed by The Intelligent Community Initiative, called Operation Energy Transition. Operation Energy Transition, currently under preparation, incorporates the best aspects of the Pickens Plan as well as Plan B and Plan C, and additional ideas. It is, however, much, much cheaper than the Pickens Plan, and will work much faster because it contains an implementing strategy known as the Intelligent Community Initiative, about which more can be discovered by visiting www.theintelligentcommunity.com.
http://www.theintelligentcommunity.com/
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| 9 comments |
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Good Question
Version:1.0 StartHTML:0000000168 EndHTML:0000000854 StartFragment:0000000489 EndFragment:0000000837 The wind power segment appears to be a significant one. A major question would be in the ownership of land and mineral rights as this Great Plains corridor happens to be over the largest aquifer in the United States. Controlling the nation's power is one thing, but controlling its water is quite another. by Dennis Kaiser (20 articles, 0 quicklinks, 35 diaries, 730 comments [137 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Nov 7, 2008 at 6:14:40 AM  (0+)
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Exactly, Dennis!
The Pickins plan is a thinly-disguised Water Privatization Grab of un-precedented proportions!, and aside from all the other points Mr Krusch made, THAT is the real Boodndoogle here! by Bia Winter (6 articles, 2 quicklinks, 14 diaries, 756 comments [119 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Nov 7, 2008 at 9:38:13 AM (0+)
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Natural gas and local environments
There is another aspect of domestic natural gas development that people ought to be aware of. The area where I lived until a year ago, the beautiful and pristine Delaware River Valley that runs between New York and Pennsylvania has now been targeted for this type of development. In order to extract the natural gas from deep crevices they must use fresh water at high pressure to crack the rocks that contain it. As valuable as fossil seems to be at the present, there may come a time when fresh water will be a much greater necessity. The Delaware Valley is one of the main sources of drinking water for New York City and the entire region. To squander this resource for a one-time energy gain is extremely short-sighted. This effort is already underway and because it involves thousands of deals with individual land owners there is very little chance of arresting it. But lets not make the mistake of including this kind of foolishness into a national plan. by Doug Rogers (16 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 152 comments) on Friday, Nov 7, 2008 at 9:40:29 AM (0+)
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Reply: I understand your concern... but
It is my understanding that the county that holds the vast majority of the NYC watershed (Delaware/ Schoharie, possibly) has been paid by NYC to specifically NOT DRILL for natural gas. Near my home in upstate NY, they in fact did have a little accident drilling. In order to get a drill bit out that was stuck deep in the ground, they over pressurized it causing many neighboring wellcaps to suddenly "pop off". The well water in the town could actually be lit on fire. Subsequently, the energy company fixed the problem and the water in that aquifer is now cleaner than before drilling. NY state is in the process of enacting legislation to protect the water supply, in fact, it may have already passed. I would gladly lease my land to the gas companies, not for the profit, but because we desperately need the energy. I don't want to be cold, hungry and in the dark. by Julia Burger (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 3 comments) on Sunday, Nov 9, 2008 at 7:15:41 AM (0+)
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Comprehensive Mass Transit
As a seperate note I wanted to remind the authors to please mention comprehensive mass transit in any discussion of energy independence or a green economy. It would be vastly more efficient and effective in reducing greenhouse gases than other options such as nuclear power or even hybrid automobiles. Therefore it should be getting exponential attention above these other prescriptions. The construction of such a system would also be consistent with plans for infrastructure investment which the Democrats are already talking about. Now is the time to raise its profile. by Doug Rogers (16 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 152 comments) on Friday, Nov 7, 2008 at 9:49:10 AM (0+)
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Your critique is incomplete
You raise the issue of 'peak natural gas' and use it to discredit the Pickens Plan. If peak Nat Gas does occur soon (someday it will happen, but perhaps not as soon as the 2010-2020 time window), then we'll have HUGE electricity generation problems when nat gas peaks. Nationally, we get over 20% of our electricity from Nat Gas (in Texas, the figure is 54%). The original idea was to use nat gas in 'peaker' plants, but now some 'base' level power generation is also done with nat gas -- a very bad idea IMO. The Pickens Plan aims to use wind power to REPLACE natural gas driven electricity generation. Moreover, Pickens acknowledges that his plan is simply a bridge to a longer-term solution i.e., it buys the country time to implement a long-term solution. In the interim, the Pickens Plan results in increased national security due to reducing our dependence on non-US sources of energy. Advocating distributed electric generation (e.g. solar) is an excellent idea IMO. With it, society regains the losses due to long distance electricity transission and the homeowner gets much 'cleaner' power (i.e., sign waves without all the noise at the top & bottom of the wave and power actually in the 115-120 Hz range). I think the general public has NO idea how crummy the power is that they get from the wall plug. by Robin Brenner (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 1 comments) on Friday, Nov 7, 2008 at 10:23:34 AM (0+)
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Picking on the Pickens Plan
As someone who signed onto the Pickens Plan back in the now dark days of the Bush Administration (BTW, he is still-president Bush), I can say Pickens was about the only one to propose a workable plan that short-attention-spanned Americans could embrace and understand. Don't overlook that. We barely got a progressive in the White House and even he had to reduce his message to one word: change. As Pickens say, the natural gas part is only supposed to get us over this hump; he was speaking when oil was over $100/barrel. Now, it seems cheaper, but really that dollar for gas is much more precious than it was this summer when gas was more expensive, due to the reccession. Given my choice,I'd prefer the Gore plan which would get us to 100% renewables in 10 years, but that is just too much - our government can't even handle a Katrina, let alone regrid the United States, and phase out coal, oil in favor of solar and wind. We can do this, but we need a bridge and a way to stop shoveling out hundreds of billions to petrostates that hate us in the meantime. That would make us all safer from terrorists too. by Scott Baker (13 articles, 51 quicklinks, 6 diaries, 162 comments [35 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Nov 7, 2008 at 10:27:55 AM (0+)
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pickens
Pickens started the swift boat lies about John Kerry. Natural gas burns hot which makes it an ideal fuel for home heating which is the way it should be used. I don't trust the guy. by clint marchbanks (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 1 comments) on Friday, Nov 7, 2008 at 12:02:15 PM (0+)
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Natural gas vehicles?
The Pickens Plan doesn't specifically promote changing passenger vehicles to natural gas, he specifically promotes converting heavy-duty vehicles to natural gas (18 wheelers). Natural gas is the only viable alternative we have right now, off the shelf technology that is capable of powering trucks. As far as consumer passenger vehicles are concerned, Pickens says they will naturallly go to the cheapest way, whatever that turns out to be. Could be plug-in hybrids, E-85, natural gas, etc. by Julia Burger (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 3 comments) on Sunday, Nov 9, 2008 at 7:04:05 AM (0+)
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