Yesterday we were in Bismarck, North Dakota; today we went to Scottsdale, Arizona. From about 13 degrees and nine inches of snow to 80’s and clear skies. All to promote the Pickens Plan.
This was a meeting of the Edison Electric Institute – the industry group of the guys who produce electricity. These are the big-time players like Southern Companies and the entrepreneurial guys who are putting together wind and solar deals.
The deal was to have a conversation with Ron Insana – you remember him from CNBC – talking about the Pickens Plan.
Not everyone in the audience was a huge supporter. Some of the guys think the existing grid is just fine and we don’t need to spend money upgrading it. Others don’t much like the part of the plan calling for using natural gas as a transportation plan because they use natural gas as a fuel in their generation plants and they’re afraid it will drive the price of natural gas up.
They’re right. It will. But domestic natural gas will still be cheaper than foreign oil. And it will always be an American resource.
Two points I want to make. First, everyone who attended the EEI conference got a copy of my book, “The First Billion is the Hardest.” Ron was kind enough to point out that all of the proceeds from the book – which is on the best seller list – go to the Ft. Bliss Army Medical Center in El Paso, Texas and to the Fisher Houses which are places where the families of wounded service members can stay while their loved one undergoes rehabilitation. Especially since this was Veterans’ Day, I was happy that Ron told everyone about that.
The second point is this: One of most senior guys from one of the biggest companies came up to me and said “Boone, we know how sincere you are about this.” You know that people in the energy business – drilling, refining, construction, or production – are not known as the most sensitive people you’ll ever meet. That fellow saying that to me, told me a lot about how much progress we’re making.
After the “conversation” I had with Ron Insana, I went and did my usual visit with the press corps.
This is really important because by being on every television station, in the local paper, and on the Associate Press means we will reach 100 times or more the number of people who were at the meeting in the Phoenix area and all through Arizona.
And I get to tell the reporters that when they interview elected officials they should ask about foreign oil, ask them about the Pickens Plan and, if they say they don’t like the Pickens Plan they should ask them what their plan is.
If they don’t have a plan, then their plan is the status quo – foreign oil.
— Boone