You’ve probably heard a fair amount about the “Pickens Plan“. So, what is it?

Essentially, the idea is to bolster domestic electrical production with a massive investment in wind turbines through the wind corridor between Texas and North Dakota. All vehicles under the plan would be fueled by biofuels and natural gas. Clean fuels that we can have abundant supplies of. There are already Natural Gas Vehicles (NGV’s) and the price of natural gas is lower than that of gasoline (even $1 a gallon in some areas) not to mention that it burns cleaner.

Ultimately…. here’s what I think all of this gets at.

The Pickens Plan pretty much calls for us to replace gasoline, but I think we will see benefits if we simply diversify our fuel and energy sources. Prices for gasoline will drop if there is less demand for gasoline, so if 30% of the cars on the road run on biodiesel or natural gas? How low would gas be? Ultimately I think our best bet is as diversified a fuel and energy strategy as possible, fuel stations are already starting to diversify, many carry regular gasoline, e85, biodiesel, etc…. if we can continue to encourage this kind of infrastructure buildup we WILL break our dependence on foreign oil. The key is the comprehensive plan.

I’m not sure if the T. Boone Pickens plan will be completely implemented or if it would solve the problem on its own, but it could be a good start in that direction. Any change in policy we take will take several years to impact our day to day reality.