USA Today turned to Boone Pickens for insight on America’s energy future. And his response was to share the virtues of the Pickens Plan:
“Energy billionaire T. Boone Pickens, a major investor in oil and natural-gas companies, said the U.S. can at least end oil imports from Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, about half its total, through new drilling and by shifting diesel-swilling trucks to natural gas. Any other oil needs should be from politically stable allies such as Canada, Pickens said.”
The newspaper noted that every American president since Richard Nixon “has called for the U.S. to wean itself from needing oil from unstable or unsavory countries.” Only now America has the opportunity to do exactly that.
“The U.S. is already the world’s fastest-growing oil and natural gas producer. Counting the output from Canada and Mexico, North America is “the new Middle East,” Citigroup analysts declare in a recent report.”
In addition to the security implications, developing America’s abundant energy resources has another crucial benefit: revitalizing our economy.
“In practical terms, more energy independence could mean 3.6 million new jobs, enough to cut unemployment by two percentage points, says Citigroup energy strategist Seth Kleinman. It could help manufacturers and chemical businesses that use lots of energy or make products from natural gas. It might give the U.S. a structural advantage on trade partners in energy costs, helping to offset the edge that cheaper labor gives nations such as China, Kleinman says. Already, U.S. natural gas prices are a seventh of what they are in Beijing, Pickens says.
Read more HERE.