Oil billionaire Pickens puts his money on wind power
(CNN) -- Billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens is putting his clout behind renewable energy sources like wind power.The legendary entrepreneur and philanthropist on Tuesday unveiled a new energy plan he says will decrease the United States' dependency on foreign oil by more than one-third and help shift American energy production toward renewable natural resources.
"The Pickens Plan" calls for investing in domestic renewable resources such as wind, and switching from oil to natural gas as a transportation fuel.
In a news conference outlining his proposal, Pickens said his impetus for the plan is the country's dangerous reliance on foreign oil.
"Our dependence on imported oil is killing our economy. It is the single biggest problem facing America today," he said. 
Watch Pickens discuss plan for wind power »
"Wind power is ... clean, it's renewable. It's everything you want. And it's a stable supply of energy," Pickens told CNN in May. "It's unbelievable that we have not done more with wind."
Pickens' company, Mesa Power, recently announced a $2 billion investment as the first step in a multibillion-dollar plan to build the world's largest wind farm in Pampa, Texas.
Pickens said Tuesday that if the United States takes advantage of the so-called "wind corridor," stretching from the Canadian border to West Texas, energy from wind turbines built there could supply 20 percent or more of the nation's power. He suggested the project could be funded by private investors.
Original Source : http://edition.cnn.com/2008/TECH/science/07/08/pickens.plan/
