UPDATE: Check out my latest update on my favorite natural gas investments.
Is the Pickens Plan still a bridge to the future?
Yesterday marked the one year anniversary for oilman T. Boone Pickens’ energy plan aimed at quelling our addiction to foreign oil. And if you’ve been reading the headlines lately, then you have undoubtedly heard about the recent roadblock thrown in front of his vision.
If you need to refresh your memory on the Pickens’ ploy to cast off our oil-coated shackles, here’s a good run down of The Plan.
In a nutshell, the plan has two main pillars of action: The first being to boost our country’s electrical generation by wind to 22%. The second (and most important, in my humble opinion) highlight was focused on boosting America’s prominent natural gas resources to replace crude oil as a transportation fuel. While there are further features to his plan, these two felt like the key factors to his platform.
That roadblock I just mentioned happened exactly one year after the Pickens Plan. T. Boone announced yesterday that he is abandoning plans to build the world’s largest wind farm in Pampa, Texas.
Now, before you prematurely jump on the skeptic bandwagon, remember that many of Pickens’ points still hold weight. With only 4% of the world’s population, we’re still guzzling 25% of the world’s crude supply. What’s worse is that we’re still importing 12 million barrels of oil every day from foreign countries (as I’ve pointed out many times before, nearly half of that comes from OPEC).
Boone’s pullback on wind makes one thing very clear to the rest of us, and I believe Pickens put it best, saying that natural gas is, “The only option at this point. It’s the one and only resource in America that today can replace foreign oil. It is a cleaner, abundant fuel.”
I couldn’t have put it better myself.
And there isn’t more opportunistic chance to capitalizing on this shift towards natural gas than right now. In fact, my colleague, Brian Hicks, also sees a huge buying opportunity developing for investors. You can check out his latest natural gas play here.
Until next time,
Keith Kohl
