Today’s Houston Chronicle features an op-ed that echoes key elements of the Pickens Plan by extolling the opportunities presented by the shale gas revolution:
The modern natural gas boom has given the United States a chance to achieve genuine energy independence and seriously cut down on carbon emissions.
The Chronicle gives an excellent overview of the drivers propelling America’s new energy economy:
Over the last decade, energy entrepreneurs have made major advances in two well-established resource development technologies – horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.” These techniques have enabled a surge in domestic natural gas production, particularly in underground shale formations that had previously been too difficult to develop. Between 2008 and 2012 alone, American gas production jumped 600 percent.
T. Boone Pickens has repeatedly pointed out that America’s vast energy reserves coupled with breakthroughs in new technology can power the nation’s economy out of the Great Recession. One of the best testaments to this prediction has been the strength of the Texas economy in general and Houston in particular, a story The Chronicle knows well:
Texas is the leading producer of natural gas in the United States, accounting for 28 percent of total national production. And here in Houston, the growing supply of low-cost gas has fueled massive economic gains. Dow Chemical just announced a billion-dollar expansion plan expected to create thousands of new positions. And the Port of Houston has benefited from $80 billion in new regional investments in the petrochemical industry.
Read more HERE.