Bloomberg Businessweek Chairman Norman Pearlstine hosted a roundtable that featured some of the country’s best minds discussing ways to tackle America’s energy woes. Those participating included BP Capital Management’s T. Boone Pickens; Bob Shapard, chairman and chief executive officer of Oncor Electric Delivery and chairman of GridWise Alliance; Carol Browner, former director of the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy for President Obama and EPA administrator for President Clinton; Jigar Shah, CEO of the Carbon War Room; and Thomas Kuhn, president of Edison Electric Institute.
A smattering of their observations follows. A link to a more comprehensive version is at the end of this story.
Thomas Kuhn: Never in the history of the world have we been so dependent upon one commodity as we are on oil right now, and every recession has been preceded by a spike in the price of oil. A $10 increase in oil causes $75 billion to come out of this economy. There are a lot of electric cars that are going on the road all over the world, in India, China, and elsewhere. I drive a Chevy Volt. I haven’t visited a gas station in three months. I plug in, I drive at 2¢ a mile compared with 10¢ to 12¢ a mile—that’s about $1 a gallon equivalent.
Boone Pickens: If you remember, President Obama, when he got the nomination, said in 10 years we will not import any oil from the Mideast. I was impressed with that. It’s different than all the other people that ran for President. They said elect me, and we’ll be energy independent. So I thought he’s got a plan, and I hope that he does have a plan.
Boone Pickens: Get yourself a crisis, and then something will come out of Congress. But we’re sitting here with a bill ready to go in the house, HR1380. There are 250 million vehicles in America: All I’m trying to address is 8 million 18-wheelers. Go to the past 10 years, and look at our costs with OPEC—$1 trillion in 10 years. The largest transfer of wealth from one group to another. Now go forward 10 years and take $100 a barrel forward, which I think is being extremely conservative. That’s $2.2 trillion. Just take the 18-wheelers, that’s 2.5 million barrels a day. Now the $2.2 trillion that we’re going to pay 10 years in the future. … You cut OPEC in half with 8 million vehicles.
Carol Browner: Between what Mr. Pickens has been talking about in terms of the long-haul vehicles and the commitment on electric cars, it would be a huge change in our fleet in this country.
Read the entire Businessweek summary HERE.