Oilman T. Boone Pickens drops $2 billion on wind power
By Donald Melanson 
posted May 20th 2008 11:48AM
posted May 20th 2008 11:48AM
It looks like wind power in the United States is getting a boost from a somewhat unexpected source, with billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens recently announcing that he's spending $2 billion to build a 667 wind turbine-strong wind farm in Texas. That would translate to roughly 1,000 megawatts of electricity, or enough to power about 300,000 homes, but Pickens says that is only the start of what he has in mind. As he tells CNN, Pickens says he plans to expand the wind farm to a full 4,000 megawatts by 2015, which would likely make it the biggest wind farm in the world. What's more, in addition to pumping out electricity, the wind turbines would give a boost to the pocketbooks of anyone willing to put 'em on their property, with Pickens estimating that each turbine will generate about $20,000 a year in royalty income, although they apparently won't get electricity straight from the turbine in their backyard.Read - CNN, "Billionaire oilman backs wind power"
Read - Reuters, "T. Boone Pickens orders 667 GE wind turbines"
...one of many that HAVE signed the Kyoto agreement!
One of the Kyoto Protocol's worst features is a sop to greens that denies carbon credits to power-starved developing countries that build nukes — thereby ensuring they'll continue to depend on filthy coal.
You may be from one of the many that signed Kyoto, but are you from one of the very few that signed, and is actually managing to meet the goals?
That same Kyoto agreement than exempted China, India and other developing countries from the emissions standards other countries had to follow? Sounds like a crippled plan that was doomed from the start.
alex terry has succumb to max ownage, has he not?
I think the old 'anything is better than nothing' saying is called for.
Might be worth you checking
http://ecofoot.org/
to find out how many earth you need if everyone lived your lifestyle. Then try and pretend this isn't the way forward.
Ah, I love when foreigners hate on good ol' America.
If not for us, they'd all be speaking German :)
::ducks::
ha, and if not for us europeans, you 'Americans' wouldn't exist...
Who gives a fuck about what your (great)grand parents did? It was all nice and so on, but current generation USA is just not looking all too friendly if you look at it from an external point of view...
Glad to see an investment in wind power.
Global warming is being proved false, the "hockey stick" average global temperature is not occurring as shown by government measurements (if it is even possible to measure the so-called average global temperature).
I own a 2008 Prius. Getting 52 MPG average over 1,000 miles on my 5 miles to work, speeds of 25 to 50 MPH. I ordered the base model Prius to reduce the cost. I spent money to use less oil.
Global warming is a farce, but buring oil is still a poison to living creatures.
LOL @ Shakes....1.21 JIGGAWATTS! CLASSIC
1) wind power is not the silver bullet people think it is... it generates less power when needed - hot out, no wind blowing - and more at night when demand is low. at best it is a supplemental resource to something like a fast-starting natural gas turbine... nameplate capacity may say over 1,000mw, but it is almost always generating far less.
2) @ wonderkid - turbines have not been proven to kill lots of birds. this is a myth. offhand, a lazy google search found this link, from a (self-labeled) treehugger site: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/04/common_misconce.php
not that i'm backing it up in a very scientific manner, but who are these people that say "xxx is proven to do xxx"? when they're talking out of their asses?
667? Not 666? Or 668? 667? Not even 700 or 650? Really? 667?
I wonder if the last one was free or if they insisted?
Is anybody else interested in cutting down the 667'th windturbine just to make it an even 666 in Texas?
Check out that town in Missouri. Makes enough power to power the whole town and sells back enough power to do the same for another. It has 4 turbines, I believe. Who else has the money to invest in a greener power??? They have a big carbon foot print to work off.
this lame carbon footprint BS makes me sick every time i read it
I'm an Oklahoma State University Alumni and Pickens is well known for his generosity with us. He donated 165 million to athletics (up to over 300 million through investing in his company) and he's more than likely about to make a MAJOR donation to Academics at OSU real soon. From what I've heard, this might even surpast the 165 million to athletics. Pickens is a great man and is VERY generous. He has not only donated to OSU, but he's donated millions ot other universities, Katrina, and other things I can't think of off the top of my head. He is a great man who has a motto "I love making money and I love giving it away".
I used to live in Oklahoma, where a "breezy" day was 30 mph, and a standard day is about 15-20mph. So if Texas' wind is anything like its northern neighbor, there is plenty of wind for use in making power. I wanted to put up a small turbine in my yard, but didn't have the nerve to do it.
Biscuit head
too bad by the times these pay themselves off we will have found another source of alternative energy, so the dude living on a giant waste dump of bacteria farting enzymes will be able to create more fuel and energy than this guy's 667 wind turbines that are abhorrently huge and change the landscape of the barron plains in TX....and he will be waiting a lot longer than 150 years:
see: http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/1433/
I know that GM is investing in this...then the 12.1 Jigawatt Delorean Mr fusion will become a reality
You know the payback on this wind farm investment is 4 years without any government subsidies, right? The bacteria idea is great, but I highly doubt it'll be usable in any large numbers by 2012.
Steve, you are right that is just royalty...so I reserve judgement, and since he's a multi-billionaire I'm sure it ain't a stupid decision financially. Still think the neighbors will be pissed and I think that bacteria methane is really cool. They eat your garbage and flatulate gas, win win situation for those of us paying 4.40 for gas in chicago.
Seems like this violates Sangamon's Principle...
I think there's a lot of potential in wind farming. Keep in mind that there is no silver bullet. In searching for alternative energy we are not simply searching for one perfectly efficient, cheap, clean, renewable resource. We are searching for as many as we can find! When we have many sources of energy working together we will no longer be dependent on single sources.
I personally think there's a lot of hype behind global warming, but there are many, many other reasons to find alternative energy.
And why are people so offended when people try to make money? Just because something is done to make money does not make it evil. That is the goal of most companies...
"And why are people so offended when people try to make money? Just because something is done to make money does not make it evil. That is the goal of most companies..."
I don't understand it. There's a certain sector of liberal (not all of them) that believes that there is only "x" amount of money available in the world, and when one person makes a billion dollars, they basically did it by stealing it out of the pockets of every orphan, widow, and Democrat in the world.
People adverse to wealth scare me, mainly because they don't understand how the world works.
I am all for it, but all the cheap green electricity will not help our dependence on foreign oil until we develop a plug in electric vehicle with batteries good enough to get the average commuter to and from work on a charge.
Record oil prices are making clean sources of energy look more affordable every day.
Everyone here does understand that electricity is usually generated from natural gas, water, coal or nuclear fission, right? AND NOT OIL.
Basically, I'm wondering why the hell everyone is talking about oil and gasoline prices here.
Your local power station does not run on premium unleaded.
WTF does oil have to do with this post.
And exactly how much energy will it take to produce these wind turbines.
If they are perfectly sited, they will be net energy sinks for many years, and only then be a contributor to reduction in CO2.
If they are not perfectly sited, they will NEVER produce as much energy as they took to build in the first place.
Please email the producers of these things to submit net energy balance data on their installations.
I have asked this of several operators, and they have never responded with specific data.
Why do you believe these wind turbines are net energy producers?
What actual historical energy production vs. energy cost data have you seen for them?
I've looked, and can only find theoretical calculations based on optimistic output estimates on the internet.
What gives?
From what I can find from the below sources, the average commercial wind turbine generates enough energy to offset its production, install maintenance and decommission within 2-3 months of production. Worst case, using 100% coal power to build one, 12 months.
http://www.wind-works.org/articles/EnergyBalanceofWindTurbines.html
http://www.awea.org/pubs/documents/faq2002%20-%20web.pdf
http://www.infra.kth.se/fms/utbildning/lca/projects%202006/Group%2007%20(Wind%20turbine).pdf
That last link goes into extreme detail, step-by-step and process by process the amount of electricity and materials that go into a modern turbine. Life Cycle Energy payback = it'll produce 20-24 times more energy than it'll consume over the entire 20 year lifetime of the turbine.
He'd better tell Doc and Marty he's only .21 Gigiwatts away from time travel... now only if he could find a flux capacitor.
I don't believe that money spent on generating *more* power is the answer - we need to be investing money in ways to use the power we already generate more efficiently. Just my $0.02.
Why not do both?
Steve A.
Why don't they use actual data for energy consumption at the manufacturer vs. energy produced by the turbine?
The assumptions made in the last report are so skewed to the advantage of the manufacturer as to be useless.
They estimate that the turbine will produce 30% of its nameplate capacity over its 20 year life span.
What is the actual percentage?
More like 10%, from what I have been able to determine from published sources.
So, even using the favorable production figures, the 12 month figure all of a sudden becomes 3 years.
And if you take into account manufacturing realities, that three years starts looking more like 6 years.
Again, it should be the responsibility of the proponents of these things to prove, with transparent processes, that they are producing energy, and not just making a profit off of subsidies and carbon trading.
I'll give you another example, the electric companies in most countries are required to purchase power from wind turbines at their highest price. You could substitute diesel electric generators for the wind turbines and still make a profit at those prices, but you wouldn't be doing anything for the environment.
j.pickens, I don't think they can get much more indepth than that last study I referenced.
The one wind plant I covered and visited extensively when I was a local CBS producer was the 230 megawatt Wild Horse Wind plant in Central Washington State. My house was about 15 miles from the plant.
http://www.horizonwind.com/images_projects/Wild_Horse/WH_FAQ_PSE_020905.pdf
That plant was estimated by PSE to produce 33% of its rated capacity annually, but I know from the monthly 5-7 dollar wind power *credit* I get on my monthly bill, they're generating *more* than they anticipated from the plant, and actually passing the savings directly to the consumer. I believe they've realized a 37% capacity over the past year. The utility has had so much success, that they're adding another 25 turbines.
I have no clue where you're getting this 10% figure from, but from my experience, which is visiting the plants, interviewing the workers and mangers of the plant, to seeing money back on my own electric bill, I can assure you that these wind generators are producing substantial amounts of clean energy.
BTW, my electricity rates are some of the lowest in the nation, @$0.058 kWh.
I've been going to school out here in west Texas for 2 years - and it's amazing the amount of wind turbines that have been added. They've added several hundred already, and a "normal" day is 10-30mph wind, and some days we get 80mph gusts. The sad the is, we pump all that electricity to Houston/Austin/Waco/Central Texas. But....we pay 4.5 cents per Kwh so I can't complain.
wow, props to Boone for taking the plunge.
kjb434 - I partially agree with you.
I think we need to do both. invest in our current oil driven world, and invest to the future (IE: clean energies).
I'm for everything, building wind turbines, oil refineries, solar farms, coal plants, nuclear plants, underwater turbines, ect. ect.
I want the US to be in control of the US. and not be a mere puppet to the middle east. We shouldn't be going to other countries (Bush went to Saudi Arabia like a week ago) and beg them to crank up production and drilling. WE use it, WE should get it.
We need to drill in Alaska & the Gulf of Mexico, and more drilling in North Dakota (bakken oil field).
I am a realist, which is pretty much in the middle of "Tree hugger" and "Tree killer".
The earth is NOT warming, and carbon dioxide is still not confirmed to be a greenhouse gas. But just because of these facts doesn't mean we cant still make the earth a cleaner place, But we have to do it at the right speed, if we convert from oil to wind (for example) really fast, our economy will tank.
Our economy is already not doing so hot, in large part because of Oil.
We have plenty of oil, we could continue to thrive on it for at least another 50 years. Dont go and spin what I have said, I'm not in favor or using oil forever, but big change takes time.
I think the environmentalists have gone to far.
(I like green things to...but come on, everything/one has their limits)
Hoaxes:
global warming... - (again) Carbon dioxide is NOT a green house gas.
storms will get more violent... - No proof of this.
Ice caps will melt and sea levels will rise (20 feet according to Gore) which of course would flood our coastal cities.... - think about it people, when water freezes in EXPANDS....so when it unthaws is CONTRACTS....which would mean the sea levels would go lower (if anything).
sorry for my long winded rambling.
I'll say it again, Props to Oilman on the wind farm.
Murc, there is so much wrong in your post, I don't know where to start.
1. Carbon dioxide *is* a greenhouse gas. Try this your self: get two sealable, empty glass jars, two temperature gauges, and a small amount of dry ice. Put the cube of dry ice one jar, and close both jars. Leave them in a sunny place for 24 hours. Then read the temp gauges in each jar. You'll see a noticeable difference with the jar that has higher percentages of CO2 (from the dry ice). So, more CO2 in a contained area will trap more energy from the sun, thus creating a heating effect. Pretty simple
2. You are correct that when ice melts, it contracts, but this isn't 100% of the story with the water level. Floating ice displaces the same amount it weighs in water. As the ice melts, even though the molecule structure contracts, it still weighs the same, so the water level also stays the same. Try this with ice in a full glass of water. Let it melt.
What you aren't taking into account is that there is a huge amount of ice sitting above and out of the water. Greenland has a huge amount of frozen water just waiting to melt and join the sea. This water will add to the total in the oceans. If you melted all the ice on Greenland and Antarctica, then yes, you'll see the oceans rise many feet/meters.
This stuff is 5th grade science.
Don't forget the carbon credits these wind farms will generate.
No one knows yet what carbon taxes will add to energy bills here in the U.S., but if you get electricity from coal or even "clean" natural gas, you will be paying $$$.
Pickens will be happy to sell credits to your local utility so they don't have to retrofit or build more efficient (but more expensive) fossil-fired plants.
Really?! Its probably a little more funny to me (and maybe other people in Oklahoma). Here (in Oklahoma) Boon Pickens is known for one thing, and that is pouring millions of dollars into Oklahoma State University football. I think he has literally paid for their entire stadium and everything else that has to do with football. So i guess i am just surprised that he has found another way to throw away his money. But on the upside i bet he will get a better return from wind power than he ever has from OSU.
Why would someone use 667-1.5MW turbines when they could use far less by using a 2.3MW (435) or 3.0MW (333) turbine?
You could fit more on the same amount of land and the extra foundation cost for a larger MW machine would be far less than the extra foundations you would need for the extra machines.
667 vs 333 foundations - seems like a no brainer.
"T. Boone Pickens" ??? Man...billionaires get all the cool names.
This ones almost as good a south american telecom mogul 'Carlos Slim'...
@kjb434
You don't have a clue as to what you are talking about. First of all, we don't use Oil for electricity dumbshit. Second, Wind power is actually very cost-effective compared to many alternatives, although in many areas Solar thermal is even better. With large scale development and continued technology development, Renewable sources will be nearly as cheap as coal, and a whole lot better for the planet. With a surplus of energy, we can remove oil completely and use a combination of biofules (NOT corn ethanol), hydrogen, and direct electricity for vehicles.
Even a Texas tycoon like T. Boone Pickens knows -- this is No Country for Oil Men...
Check out this cool take on the subject:
http://video.titantv.com/content/000101TD/video.aspx
would like to know who has the dirtworks contract on pickens texas wind farm
@engr42
I work for GE Wind and will likely be involved in moving these turbines to the site in TX. The reason the 1.5's sell more than the 2.x turbines is the cost of transportation. They do an analysis on the total cost to install a turbine and divide it by the power it generates to get a $ / KW hour number. So while the 2.x's produce more energy... the cost to install them is a lot higher and that $ / KW hour falls out of what's economincally feasible.
This is also the same reason Solar hasn't taken off (yet... the manufacturing costs will drop within 3 years and Solar will see a similar growth boom as Wind). When it comes to renewable energy... Wind is the cheapest and fastest to install.
@ anyone who thinks these aren't profitable
You must be on drugs. I have no idea why people would look at how quickly this industry has grown over the past 3 - 5 years and think no one is making money. EVERYONE involved in the supply chain for wind turbines is raking in the money. EVERYONE. The Production Tax Credit (what subsidizes the industry) might be keeping the little guys in business but the big 5 - 6 manufacturers of Wind turbines who own ~80% of the market don't need this to make money.
This wind power is a gift from the Universe. Humans have evolved to the point that everyone should know that we don't have to spend trillions of dollars and spoil our planet to have power. WE ARE BEYOND IT. We need to recognize this and avoid further dependence on oil completely. These simpler modes of energy will set us free. Just remember there are very wealthy and influential people that don't want us to have independence from them/oil. We could have had this cheap energy years and years ago but these people have successfully poo-pooed it. We must fight to have our government advance this and not let the already rich rulers tell us it won't work.
I want a wind power system that can also provide greaseless and skinless grilled fowl breasts on my plate within nanoseconds (but leave the bone in for prime moisture retainment).