Richmond, Va. --America needs to use its abundant natural gas to end its dangerous dependence on foreign oil, Texas oil and gas executive T. Boone Pickens told the Governor's Conference on Energy yesterday in Richmond.
America's dependence on overseas petroleum puts U.S. dollars in hostile pockets, Pickens said, at the same time the country has a 200-year supply of natural gas.
Thanks to recent gas shale discoveries, "we're No. 1 in the world with natural gas," he said.
If the U.S. doesn't take advantage of those resources, he warned last night, "We're going to go down as the dumbest generation that ever came to town."
More than a thousand business representatives, government officials, academic researchers, energy entrepreneurs and lobbyists filled the Greater Richmond Convention Center for the energy conference, which ends today.
And state Secretary of Commerce and Trade James Cheng told the conference, "Energy means jobs" for Virginia.
America imports two-thirds of the oil it consumes, Pickens said, mostly to fuel cars and trucks. Just by converting the nation's fleet of 18-wheelers to natural gas, the U.S. could cut its dependence on OPEC oil in half in seven years.
"We need to use our own resources instead of buying from the enemy," Pickens said earlier, at a news conference with Gov. Bob McDonnell. "Part of what you're paying for oil is going to the Taliban."
Concerns about extracting natural gas from shale deposits by hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," are overblown, said Pickens, because gas shale lies far beneath aquifers. "There's no way anything can get into the aquifer," Pickens said.
Earlier in the day, McDonnell challenged business people to suggest ways state government can aid the development of Virginia's energy sources.
"I want to solve problems," McDonnell said in a luncheon speech. "I want to fix things."
Calling energy a "critically important issue," McDonnell said he favors an "all-of-the-above strategy" that involves increased development of Virginia's fossil fuels such as coal; possible alternative sources such as wind; and also nuclear power.
McDonnell renewed his call for the drilling of oil and natural gas off the Virginia coast -- a possibility the federal government put on hold in spring, after the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
The governor said he expects the federal government eventually to allow exploratory drilling off the coast.
McDonnell also called on federal officials to speed up the issuance of permits for energy projects.
The governor's $500 green-jobs tax credit left Alexandria's Kent Baake cold. Baake's Continuum Energy Solutions designs and installs solar energy systems.
"I'm a business owner," Baake said. "That incentive is not a motivation for me to hire more employees."
He urged creating special tax credits to spur the solar energy business.
Glen Besa, director of the Virginia chapter of the Sierra Club, said the governor offered "no new solutions or initiatives."
"This is a conference in search of a purpose," Besa said.
State Secretary of Natural Resources Doug Domenech said government's role in the energy sphere, should be to:
• encourage cost-effective, viable energy alternatives, while supporting efforts to increase energy security;
• promote innovation without picking winners and losers; and
• remove unnecessary government bureaucracy while still protecting the environment.
"Get out of the way and let entrepreneurs risk their money for profit," Domenech said.
