Which Energy Independence Plan is Better — T. Boone Pickens or Google? Part 2

November 04, 2008

If you think it’s odd that a Texas oilman is proposing a plan to build massive wind farms to wean the U.S. from its dependence upon fossil fuels, consider this: He’s got competition from an even more unlikely player — a company that isn’t even in the energy industry. I’m talking about none other than Google, the search engine, online advertising and video giant that is currently angling to take over the software world with its Google Chrome browser and suite of cloud-computing applications.
(Here’s my previous blog on that subject.)

As it turns out, Google does alternative energy, too. Or rather, it wants to, in a big way. In October, the company unveiled its ambitious, multi-trillion dollar plan for weaning the U.S. away from the burning of coal and oil for electrical power and cutting the use of petroleum to power cars and trucks by nearly 40 percent by 2030. Jeffery Greenblatt the Princeton-trained researcher whom Google recently hired as its climate and energy technology manager, explains:

Google's proposal will benefit the US by increasing energy security, protecting the environment, creating new jobs, and helping to create the conditions for long-term prosperity. Some of the necessary funds will be public, but much of it will come from the private sector — a typical approach for infrastructure and high technology investments.

Here’s how Google would have us do it. In contrast with Pickens’ plan, which relies entirely upon wind power and converting vehicles to natural gas, the Internet behemoth would attack the problem from multiple angles.

Which Energy Independence Plan is Better — T. Boone Pickens, or Google? Part 1

October 27, 2008

T. Boone Pickens has been putting up so many commercials to advertise his energy independence plan that his crinkly, octogenarian visage is becoming nearly as familiar as the GEICO cavemen or Max, the annoying talking Volkswagen Beetle who startles car shoppers in VW commercials. So what is Pickens, who became the 369th richest person on the planet primarily by drilling for oil and taking over other oil companies (or attempting to do so, and driving up the price of his stock holdings), doing promoting wind power as an alternative to oil? Well, let’s let him do the talking.

From his Web site, here’s more detail on his argument for wind power, and the specifics of his plan, which he boasts could turn the U.S. into the “Saudi Arabia of wind power":