Ted Turner is living proof that success breeds success. The Atlanta-based entrepreneur revolutionized the media industry when he created CNN, the world’s first 24-hour news channel. He’s given over $1 billion to charity. Turner is also America’s largest landowner, owns more bison than any other private citizen, and successfully defended America’s Cup in 1977.
Now he’s turned his considerable talents to clean energy. Recently, Turner partnered with the Southern Co. to develop alternative energy on and off his land holdings, and he has long been one of the most vocal proponents of the Pickens Plan. On numerous occasions, he and Boone Pickens have shared the podium as the two discussed ways for America to increase its energy security by ending its addiction to imported oil and, instead, relying on cleaner domestic energy sources. In a recent interview with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, he shared insights on the opportunities afforded by such a bold shift.
On the need to modernize the nation’s energy grid:
We’ve got a hundred-year-old grid. It’s totally obsolete. It was geared for coal. We’re going to create lots of new jobs and we’re going to get cleaner air. We’re going to get energy independence, finally, where we’re not bankrupting ourselves buying all this oil from the Middle East. Boone Pickens, he and I are buddies. He’s a right-wing Republican and I’m more of a moderate, but we agree on this whole energy thing and we should use natural gas as a transition fuel; we have lots of it.
On whether solar power and wind energy can help end our dependence on foreign fuel:
Yes, I think they can. In fact, I know they can, if we use enough of it. Both wind and solar are intermittent somewhat, because on a cloudy day, they don’t put out at peak velocity. And when there’s no wind, the wind machines don’t run. But we can use natural gas as the base-load. Or nuclear. Or geothermal, if it will work economically.
Read the entire interview HERE.