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The Pickens Plan is too complex and expensive (not to mention self-serving).

It forces everyone to switch to a NEW platform of cars that are INCOMPATIBLE with normal existing gasoline fuel. So if you're driving your natural gas Pickensmobile, and can't find a natural gas station, you're out of luck.

That's why it requires that we massively overhaul our entire infrastructure.

And for what? Natural gas? Liquid fuel is far more practical, but natural gas is a GAS at normal pressure and temperature. So you have to compress it under high pressure (HUGE risk of leaks and explosions) or cryogenically chill it (energy drain, safety risk, high cost, catastrophic failure problems).

Especially pointless because that same natural gas he's pushing at us can be turned (via simple, generations-old chemistry) into a fuel that IS liquid at normal pressure and temperature: methanol.

Thus the real way forward is the Energy Victory plan put forward by former NASA engineer Dr. Robert Zubrin, which is to require that all new cars sold (not made) in the US have flex fuel capability.

Flex fuel vehicles are just like normal current gasoline autos of any size, shape, function, or performance level with one CHEAP ($100~$200, unlike hybrids which cost thousands more) but critical difference: they have an additional internal fuel sensor and modifications to the fuel line and electronic fuel injector software allowing them to also use alcohol fuel (such as methanol), in the same fuel tank, in any mix (or none at all) with gasoline.

Alcohol fuel burns cleaner than gasoline - no particulate emissions hence no smog; no CO2 hence no global warming, etc. Also if spilled from supertankers or leaked from underground storage at gas stations alcohol fuel dissolves readily in days into harmless components; whereas the Exxon Valdez is still killing wildlife.

The reason we need a mandate is to break through the chicken and egg dilemma. Even though alcohol capability is cheap to add and make cheaper fuel available, few customers know about it or bother to ask for it because few gas stations have an alcohol pump. In turn, few gas stations will bother switching a pump to alcohol when only 3% of cars on the road have flex fuel capability.

With a mandate, we'd have 50 million FFVs on the road in 3 years. All would be able to fill up on gasloline if they can't find alcohol, making them a PRACTICAL bridge technology. But having a vehicle that can burn CHEAPER, safer, higher-octane, cleaner-burning fuel that does NOT fund our enemies abroad will spur demand for gas station owners to add alcohol pumps. At that point wealth is massively redirected away from the Saudis, Iranians, Venezuelans, and Russians and toward peaceful farmers and domestic coal miners (yes, coal can be made into methanol too!).

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Posted By: Carney @ 11/20/2008 11:05:10 AM

The Pickens Plan is too complex and expensive (not to mention self-serving).

It forces everyone to switch to a NEW platform of cars that are INCOMPATIBLE with normal existing gasoline fuel. So if you're driving your natural gas Pickensmobile, and can't find a natural gas station, you're out of luck.

That's why it requires that we massively overhaul our entire infrastructure.

And for what? Natural gas? Liquid fuel is far more practical, but natural gas is a GAS at normal pressure and temperature. So you have to compress it under high pressure (HUGE risk of leaks and explosions) or cryogenically chill it (energy drain, safety risk, high cost, catastrophic failure problems).

Especially pointless because that same natural gas he's pushing at us can be turned (via simple, generations-old chemistry) into a fuel that IS liquid at normal pressure and temperature: methanol.

Thus the real way forward is the Energy Victory plan put forward by former NASA engineer Dr. Robert Zubrin, which is to require that all new cars sold (not made) in the US have flex fuel capability.

Flex fuel vehicles are just like normal current gasoline autos of any size, shape, function, or performance level with one CHEAP ($100~$200, unlike hybrids which cost thousands more) but critical difference: they have an additional internal fuel sensor and modifications to the fuel line and electronic fuel injector software allowing them to also use alcohol fuel (such as methanol), in the same fuel tank, in any mix (or none at all) with gasoline.

Alcohol fuel burns cleaner than gasoline - no particulate emissions hence no smog; no CO2 hence no global warming, etc. Also if spilled from supertankers or leaked from underground storage at gas stations alcohol fuel dissolves readily in days into harmless components; whereas the Exxon Valdez is still killing wildlife.

The reason we need a mandate is to break through the chicken and egg dilemma. Even though alcohol capability is cheap to add and make cheaper fuel available, few customers know about it or bother to ask for it because few gas stations have an alcohol pump. In turn, few gas stations will bother switching a pump to alcohol when only 3% of cars on the road have flex fuel capability.

With a mandate, we'd have 50 million FFVs on the road in 3 years. All would be able to fill up on gasloline if they can't find alcohol, making them a PRACTICAL bridge technology. But having a vehicle that can burn CHEAPER, safer, higher-octane, cleaner-burning fuel that does NOT fund our enemies abroad will spur demand for gas station owners to add alcohol pumps. At that point wealth is massively redirected away from the Saudis, Iranians, Venezuelans, and Russians and toward peaceful farmers and domestic coal miners (yes, coal can be made into methanol too!).
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Posted By: Downix @ 11/17/2008 7:47:20 AM

Newt has missed the point, and the opportunity. He has failed to read nor understand various alternative energy plans for years, Pickens plan included. He fails to understand that a Natural Gas car *is* using an Internal Combustion engine (save for Dean Kamen's Sterling based engine, which is an external combusion, but I digress). The beauty of Pickens plan is simple, you can not only convert future production, but you can convert existing automobiles to natural gas fairly quickly and inexpensively. A new industry, just waiting to be grasped. Millions of jobs on the line, and he keeps spouting the same old answers.
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Posted By: urbnsurfr @ 11/07/2008 11:35:10 AM

George J. Papagiannes, I respectfully disagree with your position. I think the point that Newt was trying to make was that while it is relatively easy to produce new cars that run on natural gas, it will take nearly 20 years to get the bulk of the existing gasoline engines off the road. There's also the problem of building up the infrastructure for natural gas refilling stations. Not insurmountable, and a good idea. Just not something you can do next week and also not "the long term solution" since we're talking about a finite resource that still emits carbon dioxide.