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The ultimate gas guy
July 1, 2009 By: Patrick Hyland LPGas
B oone Pickens is the propane industry’s kind of guy: a perfect blend of prairie-tough Republican businessman wrapped in homespun Dixie charm and wit.
Whether making a multi-million dollar deal, kicking around ideas with his campaign staff or lecturing a room of inquisitive visitors eager to meet the 81-year-old business icon, Pickens doesn’t pull punches. His insights and opinions arrive the only way he knows to give them – colorful, humorous and effectively simple and straightforward.
And when the Oklahoma native and billionaire west Texas rancher speaks, people listen. That’s why our industry is thrilled to climb onboard his infamous Pickens Plan, which is at the center of a national energy policy debate that will change the rules of consumer energy consumption for generations to come.
Introduced last July by the longtime oilman, the Pickens Plan is a comprehensive approach to ending America’s growing dependence on foreign oil while reducing the environmental impact of fossil fuels. His alternative? A package of wind, solar, natural gas, nuclear and anything else produced in the U.S.A.
And given its environmentally friendly profile and ample domestic production (plus the $1 million our industry added to the campaign kitty), propane is a logical addition to his scheme.
“Propane is clean, it’s American-made, and it can be put to work right now,” the popular Pickens told more than 300 thrilled propane industry attendees at Propane Days in Washington, D.C., last month.
The Pickens-propane marriage is a monumental step amid the most critical energy policy debate in our nation’s history. While propane fares well compared to other energy prices, availability and “green” footprint, our story isn’t being heard in the din of lobbyists at the table.
In an April research study of 1,100 national opinion leaders done for the Propane Education & Research Council (PERC), a stunning 60 percent said propane was not in the discussion. Conversely, 80 percent favored the then-propaneless Pickens Plan.
That same month, PERC ponied up funds to add our product name as a tagline to Pickens’ $60 million multi-media blitz.
Catchy phrases and compelling, patriotic TV ads are no guarantee of a favorable legislative outcome, of course. Even as 20 million Americans join the growing Pickens army, the oil industry has opened its spigots for lobbyists to protect record profits, slow change away from fossil fuels and blunt the impact of costly climate change legislation pushed by President Barack Obama.
The Associated Press reports that big oil spent $44.5 million lobbying Congress and federal agencies in just the first three months of 2009. That pace will shatter last year’s record spend of $129 million, which was up a whopping 73 percent from 2007. That’s a faster clip than any other major industry, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics.
Pickens, who said he uses a propane stove on his ranch, likes his chances against the deep-pocket influence of his former colleagues.
“I am much more powerful in D.C. with an army of 20 million than I ever was as a single rich guy from Texas,” he said in typical Boone style.
“I am going to accomplish this mission,” he assured the audience. “Because you’re either for the plan or you’re for foreign oil.”
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