The Public Broadcasting System program Frontline aired a two-hour program named “Heat” Tuesday night. Boone Pickens was interviewed for the program. Here’s a transcript of one section of Boone’s comments:
FRONTLINE: In the transport sector, what do you think looks best for replacing oil?
BOONE: Our dependency is so extreme I don’t think anybody can say we can accomplish that unless they’re saying in 100 years or 50 years we’ve got to get off of oil.
But the best transportation fuel you can have, which has been totally stymied by the automobile and oil companies in America, is natural gas. Natural gas is the best transportation fuel. It’s better than gasoline or diesel. It’s cleaner, it’s cheaper, and it’s domestic. Natural gas is 97 percent domestic fuel, North America.
FRONTLINE: In terms of emissions, how does it compare to ethanol?
BOONE: Natural gas would be probably 50 to 75 percent cleaner than ethanol.
FRONTLINE: Why haven’t we invested more in natural gas vehicles?
BOONE: Well, the major oil companies, the marketers of gasoline, they don’t want to change what they’re doing. And what they’re doing is done well. I’m not being critical of them. It’s just a culture that has to be changed when you do it.
FRONTLINE: Is it about money? Is it about building new grids and pipes?
BOONE: No. Natural gas is better distributed than any other fuel in the United States. It’s down every street and up every alley. There’s a pipeline. So the natural gas is available everywhere. They say, “Well, you’re going to have to build stations, and they’re going to have to have compressors to do it, and you’re going to have to change engines in the cars and everything else.”
To me that’s not a government cost — leave that up to industry. Just get industry behind what you’re doing, and it all works because natural gas is cleaner, cheaper, and it’s a domestic fuel.
You can read the entire transcript of Boone’s portion here. And you can watch the entire program online by clicking here.
If you want to help put The Pickens Plan in front of the show’s producer, he will have an on-line chat at 11:00 am EDT today. You can join the chat (and get the Pickens Plan in front of all the other chatters) by clicking here
— The Pickens Plan Team