“I’ve been an awl man my whole life.” So begins a major political marketing campaign financed this election season by — make that “oil” man — T. Boone Pickens.
It is an extraordinary undertaking by a billionaire convinced that the way we’ve been doing things for the last 100 years, isn’t going to cut it for another 100. The Pickens’ energy plan, which you can read about in detail on his Web site, encourages the U.S. government to help the private sector to invest in natural gas and wind power to reduce our dependence on foreign oil.
When Pickens began his campaign, gasoline prices were rising toward $5 a gallon. Although that trajectory has been halted, there is no doubt those prices are in our future. The sense of urgency should still be there. Something needs to be done. Something very different.
In mid-August, Pickens met privately and separately with John McCain and Barack Obama to explain his proposal. He says both listened intently, asked serious questions and made no commitments. Pickens says the private sector can pay for a lot of the investment needed to make our country energy independent. What is most needed from government is permission to site new natural gas and wind power facilities.
Needed: Long-Term Answers
It seems simple — especially when articulated with an Oklahoma accent dripping with Texas twang — but it’s not. Government, governed as it is by politics, moves slowly toward consensus the more polarized an issue becomes. And the issue of lower energy prices hangs right between the interests of energy companies and environmentalists. These are two special interests that are inconveniently — for us — aligned with the Republican and Democratic parties, respectively.
The only thing that can force Democrats and Republicans to talk seriously about a more visionary energy policy is a multimillion dollar ad campaign that turns an issue we all know into a political problem that can’t be ignored.
Faced with rising energy prices here in Connecticut, leaders at the state Capitol can only argue about how to redistribute a small — some say — questionable budget surplus, to help people pay those higher prices. This is not a solution; it is a redistribution of wealth that sustains the problem by subsidizing high prices.
Although energy policy is primarily seen as a federal government issue, states have a role to play from an economic development perspective. Setting aside the issue of tapping existing oil fields and offshore drilling, where some states have a resource advantage, incubating alternative energy research and development can make a state as small as Connecticut a major player.
The Connecticut Center for Advanced Technology produced a report this year for the state Department of Economic and Community Development that lays out a road map for the expansion of Connecticut’s role in fuel cell and hydrogen fuel development. The plan recommends tax incentives, grants and other programs to dramatically expand an industry that already employs more than 1,000 Connecticut residents.
Like all visionary thinking, it looks beyond the issue of today — high fuel prices — and seeks the future opportunity wrapped inside the challenge. And like all visionary thinking, it requires government leaders to place a bet that could lead to failure. Such bets are rarely placed by politicians with one eye on the next election.
The emerging energy crisis will have winners and losers. Our role is to force government to invest in answers that put us in a position to come out on the winning side of the changing energy market.
Dean Pagani is a former gubernatorial advisor. He is V.P. of Public Affairs for Cashman and Katz Integrated Communications in Glastonbury.
