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T. Boone Pickens is up in arms over NBC's decision not to run one of his new TV ads promoting the use of natural gas as a transportation fuel, and an alternative to importing expensive foreign oil. In an e-mail to supporters Mr. Pickens is quoted as saying, "NBC is refusing to run one of our strongest ads, and I need your help in showing NBC they can't control what we can or cannot say." The new 15-second TV spot, entitled "Iran is Changing Its Cars to Run on Natural Gas," calls attention to this development by this OPEC member...

Texas oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens is about to make a killing by selling water he doesn’t own. As he does it, it will be praised as a planet-friendly wind project. The basic story amounts to this: Pickens, thanks to favors from state lawmakers whose campaigns he funded, has created a new government whose only voters are two of his employers; this has empowered Pickens to more cheaply pump water from an aquifer and, by use of eminent domain, seize land across 11 counties in order to pipe the water to Dallas. To win environmentalist approval of this hardly “sustainable”...

The more you learn about T. Boone Pickens’ plan to switch America to wind power, the more you realize that he seems willing to say and do just about anything to make another billion or two.

Pelosi Investment Shows Unlikely Energy Alliance Shares Purchased In Pickens Firm; Oil Man's New Role By IAN TALLEY August 23, 2008 WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her husband invested between $50,000 and $100,000 in T. Boone Pickens's Clean Energy Fuels Corp., which could benefit from legislation the California Democrat favors to boost U.S. use of natural gas. The investment is a small fraction of the Pelosis' net worth. But it highlights the unlikely alliance evolving between Mr. Pickens, an oil man with a long history of support for Republican causes, and powerful Democrats who have welcomed Mr. Pickens's...

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Eight scientific organizations urged the next U.S. president to help protect the country from climate change by pushing for increased funding for research and forecasting, saying about $2 trillion of U.S. economic output could be hurt by storms, floods and droughts. "We don't think we have the right kind of tools to help decision makers plan for the future," Jack Fellows, the vice president for corporate affairs of the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, a consortium of 71 universities, told reporters in a teleconference on Wednesday. The groups, including the American Geophysical Union and the American...

It's amazing how ideas with no merit become popular merely because they sound good. Most every politician and pundit says "energy independence" is a great idea. Presidents have promised it for 35 years. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we were self-sufficient, protected from high prices, supply disruptions and political machinations? The hitch is that even if the United States were energy independent, it would be protected from none of those things. To think otherwise is to misunderstand basic economics and the global marketplace. To be for "energy independence" is to be against trade. But trade makes us as safe. Crop...

Google, Paul Allen back geothermal startup By JOHN COOK P-I REPORTER AltaRock Energy believes it can harvest energy by fracturing rocks deep below the Earth's surface, using the heat from those rocks to create electricity. Some deep-pocketed investors -- including Google, Paul Allen's Vulcan Ventures and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers -- are big believers in the concept, too. They are among the investors leading a $26.25 million venture round in AltaRock, money that the 14-month-old company will use to test the concept at an undisclosed site next year. Sausalito, Calif.-based AltaRock, which was founded in Seattle by Susan Petty...

...in May 2007, Pelosi invested between $100,001 and $250,000 to purchase public common stock in Pickens’ Clean Energy Fuels Corporation (CLNE). Pelosi's CLNE investment was first highlighted by the Michigan Taxes Too Much and #don'tgo blogs. CLNE is a cog in Pickens’$6 billion plan to build a massive wind farm in west Texas and to switch millions of vehicles on American roads from gasoline to natural gas. Pelosi’s CLNE purchase is listed on her most recent congressional personal financial disclosure form, which can be viewed at Opensecrets.org. A search of Pelosi’s official web site found no announcement of the investment...

As the members of the MSM continue to beat the drums for “renewable” energy, and T. Boone Pickens promises pie-in-the-sky free energy from windmills the corruption surrounding Green Energy is beginning to be revealed. Literally hundreds of billions of dollars are involved and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is only the latest to be found with her hand in the cookie jar. Here’s the unvarnished truth: the world has been getting most of its energy from fossil fuels for over a century. During the 20th century we began to see the use of nuclear energy. In the US that path to...

LAS VEGAS -- How do we make Nevada and the rest of the country more energy efficient? That's the question environmental experts and politicians are hoping to answer at a two-day summit at University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Former President Bill Clinton kicked off the event Monday night with a challenge to the Silver State. The former president said the only way to get everyone on board to go green is to make one state completely clean energy self-sufficient -- and he thinks Nevada has what it takes. “Maybe what you ought to do is come out of this conference...

It is difficult to imagine a more unlikely pair of investors than House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens. Pelosi, the San Francisco Democrat, is among the most liberal and pro-environmentalist politicians in Congress, while Pickens has long been associated with Republicans, hedge funds and the energy industry. Yet in May 2007, Pelosi invested between $100,001 and $250,000 to purchase public common stock in Pickens’ Clean Energy Fuels Corporation (CLNE). Pelosi's CLNE investment was first highlighted by Eric Odom on the #don'tgo blog. CLNE is a cog in Pickens’$6 billion plan to build a massive wind farm...

In this year's great energy debate, Democrats describe a future when the U.S. finally embraces the anything-but-carbon avant-garde. It turns out, however, that when wind and solar power do start to come on line, they face a familiar obstacle: environmentalists and many Democrats. To wit, the greens are blocking the very transmission network needed for renewable electricity to move throughout the economy. The best sites for wind and solar energy happen to be in the sticks -- in the desert Southwest where sunlight is most intense for longest, or the plains where the wind blows most often. To exploit this...

RENO, Nevada (Reuters) - White House hopeful Barack Obama talked energy policy on Sunday with T. Boone Pickens, a billionaire oil investor who funded the "Swift Boat" attacks on Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry in 2004. Pickens, a lifelong Republican, has endorsed neither his party's candidate, Arizona Sen. John McCain, nor Democrat Obama in the November 4 election and wants to make energy a top campaign issue. He has advocated a plan to cut U.S. oil use by converting cars to run on natural gas. Pickens funded efforts in 2004 by a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which...

John Yancey leans against his truck in a field outside his home, his face contorted in anger and pain. John Yancey doesn't like the Maple Ridge Wind Farm turbines and the deal his father signed for them. "Listen," he says. The rhythmic whoosh, whoosh, whoosh of wind turbines echoes through the air. Sleek and white, their long propeller blades rotate in formation, like some otherworldly dance of spindly-armed aliens swaying across the land. Yancey knows the towers are pumping clean electricity into the grid, knows they have been largely embraced by his community But Yancey hates them.

[ROBERT M. SYKES is Professor emeritus Civil and environmental engineering Ohio State University Mount Vernon] I was disappointed to see that the very large negative effects on both Ohio's economy and environment were not discussed in the July 27 article "Wind power likely to blow in," on the wind-power projects in Champaign County. The first issue is the high cost of wind power, which is about 2.5 to three times the cost of coal-generated power. Large wind-power projects exist only because of large government subsidies. Otherwise, wind power would be restricted to a few applications where the physical isolation of...

1. Introduction Background and Purpose In May 2007, Senator Lamar Alexander asked the Energy Information Administration (EIA) to develop an analysis of Federal energy-specific subsidies that provide a financial benefit with an identifiable budget impact. His request letter of May 12, 2007, provided as Appendix H, asked EIA to focus particularly on subsidies directed to electricity production, including an estimate of electricity subsidies on a per unit basis. In 2000, EIA enumerated and summarized energy subsidies and support generally; this report focuses on electricity production, specifically those subsidy and support programs that affect the production of primary fuels used to...

DALLAS, Aug 15, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Below is a statement issued by T. Boone Pickens following his meeting this morning with U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) in Aspen, Colorado: "It was a pleasure to sit down with Senator McCain and discuss firsthand an issue that is America's top priority: ending our dependence on foreign oil, which today is approaching 70 percent. We plan on having a similar meeting with Senator Obama in the very near future. I have repeatedly stressed the nonpartisan aspects of my initiative. This is a threat to our economic and national security and something that...

By Michelle Malkin  •  August 15, 2008 02:39 PM John McCain met with T. Boone Pickens yesterday to hear the Big Wind sales pitch. Hey, why should Nancy Pelosi have all the Boone-doggly fun? Hmmmmm: T. Boone Pickens was waiting for John McCain in a small conference room at the Aspen Meadows Resort, where the two, according to Pickens, were going to be “talking about the Pickens plan.” “We’re going to have a good visit,” he added. Pickens, a famous oilman and one of America’s richest men, is now pushing a plan to drop the United States’ dependence on foreign oil...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called congressional Republicans who want up-or-down drilling votes “hand maidens of the oil companies.” Let’s call Pelosi what she is: House girl of the Big Wind boondogglers. Though she seemingly backtracked on labeling drilling a “hoax” this week, Pelosi refuses to consider GOP energy proposals that don’t include massive government subsidies for eco-fantastical alternatives that have never panned out. Which brings us to Madame Speaker’s 2007 financial disclosure form. Schedule III lists “assets and ‘unearned income’” of between $100,001-$250,000 from Clean Energy Fuels Corp. - Public Common Stock.” Clean Energy Fuels Corp. is a natural gas...

Webb is a senior scientist with the University of Virginia's Department of Environmental Sciences. His Web site, www.VaWind.org, addresses environmental issues associated with commercial wind energy development. Oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens is being disingenuous, telling one thing to the American people and another to Congress. He has repeatedly said that no government help is needed to pursue his plan to build the world's largest wind farm in the Texas Panhandle. Yet he is lobbying hard for extension of the Production Tax Credit and National Renewable Energy Zones -- essentially a huge tax shelter for wind industry investors and expedited...