Strange bedfellows? Look deeper.
Jul. 24th, 2008 02:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkinginthenightRecently, T. Boone Pickens, Texas oilman and former supporter of President Bush, has been running ads criticizing Bush and McCain's support for offshore oil drilling. You see, he's an oil man but he's seen the light, and we need to switch to renewable sources of energy. So he's thrown some of his significant fortune behind efforts to convince the American people to oppose more drilling. Isn't that sweet?
In today's NY Times article about this phenomenon, Timothy Egan wryly notes that Pickens just invested 10 billion dollars in building a giant wind farm in Texas, so he has something to gain from running these ads. He advances the possibility that Picken's heart might be growing just a bit:
Would it enrich him further? Yes. But perhaps it’s not about money. In “Chinatown,” the old man played by Huston was asked by Detective Jake Gittes what more he could possibly buy at his age.
“The future, Mr. Gittes. The future.”
To his credit, Egan then goes on to talk about how Pickens was behind the Swiftboat ads and is generally an unsavory character, so the Sierra Club's embrace of him might be a bit premature.
Here's the problem - Egan missed mentioning an entire major component of Pickens' support of the wind farms. Pickens recently switched from oil to water. He started up by buying a bunch of land in Texas and setting up pumps. Under Texas water law, the water rights go to whoever pumps the water first. Because water tables stretch across property boundaries, this means that two small landowners over the same aquifier will be pumping from the same supply, so whoever pumps more gets more and has the right to profit off of its sale.
Pickens has set up pumps on a massive scale, outstripping anything that a smaller ranch owner could do. He essentially has control of the water supply of an entire county, and is now looking for a buyer. They're refusing his offer. So he's put out feelers to major cities such as Dallas.
Dallas hasn't taken him up on the offer yet, but as their population continues to grow and water becomes more scarce, chances are that someone is going to accept his offer. So he's been working on more land acquisition to build a pipeline.
What did he start putting on that land? The wind farms. That made the land a utility supply corridor, meaning he could take it under eminent domain:
Pickens knew he'd have to build a pipeline, and to do so at anything resembling a reasonable cost, he'd need the power of eminent domain—the right of a government entity to force the sale of private property for the public good. Water utilities have that right. If Dallas agreed to buy Pickens' water, it could extend such authority to him. But Dallas deemed Pickens' price too high and declined to do a deal. So Pickens and his executives tried to create a Fresh Water Supply District—a government entity that would have that power. But they couldn't get it through.
Over the next several years, Pickens continued accumulating water rights and began to lease other land, this time with the idea of creating the world's biggest wind farm. "One of the great wind areas is right up where we are," says Robert L. Stillwell, Pickens' general counsel. "You can set it right on top of where the water is." And since, one day anyway, Dallas may well buy both, Mesa could use a single right-of-way for the water pipeline and the electric lines.
Pickens attacked his eminent domain problem from a number of different angles, and eventually managed to get legislation passed through dubious means that allowed him to create his water corridor without the help of the utility corridor. But now that he's invested so much in wind power to get to the water, he might as well profit off of it!
In Roberts County there would be real economic benefits from the wind farm. "The wind is meant to sweeten the deal," says Representative Chisum. "The big money for Pickens is in the water."
You can read the entire story here: There Will Be Water - Businessweek.com
Will the wind farms create clean energy? Yes. Does it set a good precedent for a major oil barron to be throwing his support behind clean energy, thereby panicking other energy barrons to do the same before Pickens has a monopoly? Sure. But his motives are nothing but profit, and I'm disappointed that Egan completely missed this. Furthermore, I hate the precedent he's setting with water acquisition, and I can only hope that better laws are passed to protect the resource for public use.
In today's NY Times article about this phenomenon, Timothy Egan wryly notes that Pickens just invested 10 billion dollars in building a giant wind farm in Texas, so he has something to gain from running these ads. He advances the possibility that Picken's heart might be growing just a bit:
Would it enrich him further? Yes. But perhaps it’s not about money. In “Chinatown,” the old man played by Huston was asked by Detective Jake Gittes what more he could possibly buy at his age.
“The future, Mr. Gittes. The future.”
To his credit, Egan then goes on to talk about how Pickens was behind the Swiftboat ads and is generally an unsavory character, so the Sierra Club's embrace of him might be a bit premature.
Here's the problem - Egan missed mentioning an entire major component of Pickens' support of the wind farms. Pickens recently switched from oil to water. He started up by buying a bunch of land in Texas and setting up pumps. Under Texas water law, the water rights go to whoever pumps the water first. Because water tables stretch across property boundaries, this means that two small landowners over the same aquifier will be pumping from the same supply, so whoever pumps more gets more and has the right to profit off of its sale.
Pickens has set up pumps on a massive scale, outstripping anything that a smaller ranch owner could do. He essentially has control of the water supply of an entire county, and is now looking for a buyer. They're refusing his offer. So he's put out feelers to major cities such as Dallas.
Dallas hasn't taken him up on the offer yet, but as their population continues to grow and water becomes more scarce, chances are that someone is going to accept his offer. So he's been working on more land acquisition to build a pipeline.
What did he start putting on that land? The wind farms. That made the land a utility supply corridor, meaning he could take it under eminent domain:
Pickens knew he'd have to build a pipeline, and to do so at anything resembling a reasonable cost, he'd need the power of eminent domain—the right of a government entity to force the sale of private property for the public good. Water utilities have that right. If Dallas agreed to buy Pickens' water, it could extend such authority to him. But Dallas deemed Pickens' price too high and declined to do a deal. So Pickens and his executives tried to create a Fresh Water Supply District—a government entity that would have that power. But they couldn't get it through.
Over the next several years, Pickens continued accumulating water rights and began to lease other land, this time with the idea of creating the world's biggest wind farm. "One of the great wind areas is right up where we are," says Robert L. Stillwell, Pickens' general counsel. "You can set it right on top of where the water is." And since, one day anyway, Dallas may well buy both, Mesa could use a single right-of-way for the water pipeline and the electric lines.
Pickens attacked his eminent domain problem from a number of different angles, and eventually managed to get legislation passed through dubious means that allowed him to create his water corridor without the help of the utility corridor. But now that he's invested so much in wind power to get to the water, he might as well profit off of it!
In Roberts County there would be real economic benefits from the wind farm. "The wind is meant to sweeten the deal," says Representative Chisum. "The big money for Pickens is in the water."
You can read the entire story here: There Will Be Water - Businessweek.com
Will the wind farms create clean energy? Yes. Does it set a good precedent for a major oil barron to be throwing his support behind clean energy, thereby panicking other energy barrons to do the same before Pickens has a monopoly? Sure. But his motives are nothing but profit, and I'm disappointed that Egan completely missed this. Furthermore, I hate the precedent he's setting with water acquisition, and I can only hope that better laws are passed to protect the resource for public use.
