You’ve probably heard about the Pickens Plan (the oil tycoon is spending $58 million on an extensive ad campaign to raise awareness). Here’s a short video outlining T. Boone Pickens’ vision for the future of energy in this country— basically achieved by investing resources to build up our wind energy infrastructure, and using our natural gas reserves instead of depending on foreign oil.

The plan would certainly help us reduce dependency on oil imports and decouple foreign policy from energy policy (and, argues Thomas Friedman, weaken leverage possessed by authoritarian oil-producing countries). In addition, it is the New Deal-type plan that many are clamoring for (while others dismiss), a large-scale infrastructure project expected to generate thousands of jobs. To that effect, Pickens cites the story of a town called Sweetwater, TX, which experienced a revival of sorts after a large wind power facility was built outside of town.

However, I can’t help thinking that this plan, ambitious as it is, lacks imagination and is not the bold type of action we really need to see. I see a few key problems:

• Pickens downplays the role of electric cars, which he says are 20-30 years away from having a real impact on the industry. When cars like the Tesla Roadster are hitting the streets in 2008, it suggests that the rest of the industry could achieve similar results given forward thinking and smart investments. We should be trying to make the country as carbon-free as possible, not simply transferring the burden of fossil fuels from international providers to the US.
• Keeping with that line of thinking, this plan does nothing to address the woes in Detroit. Any comprehensive energy policy has to have more of an impact on auto manufacturers than just converting their power source to natural gas. The confluence of problems (environmental, financial, energy) we’re facing now means that we’re looking at a historic opportunity to redefine the American auto industry and secure its long-term viability. This is a chance to breathe life into a vital (but failing) American industry by pushing investment in clean technologies and demanding innovative thinking and action.
• We need a smart national power grid to enable transfer of electricity between networks to deal with unstable wind generation (wind doesn’t blow all the time), a topic not discussed by Pickens.

Al Gore has proposed an even more ambitious plan, likening a 10-year energy independence plan to the Apollo Project to launch a successful moon landing in 10 years. The five elements of his plan, detailed here in a NYTimes op-ed by Gore, are:

• Incentives for construction of concentrating solar-thermal power plants in the southwest, wind farms in the Midwest, and plants in geothermal “hot spots.”
• A $400 billion investment over 10 years to build a “national smart grid” to distribute renewable energy, which he said would quickly offset the annual $120 billion loss from power grid failures. The power grid can be outfitted so that consumers have better tools and information for conserving energy.
• Aid to automakers to convert to the production of plug-in hybrids. Smart-grid technology that enables the cars to be charged during off-peak hours.
• A nationwide effort to retrofit buildings, which account for 40 percent of carbon dioxide emissions, to be more energy-efficient.
• Climate regulations to cap carbon dioxide emissions.

It’s clear that at this point in time, when we actually have the leverage to force two gargantuan industries (auto & energy) to redefine their modus operandi, we need big ideas that move us towards the vision of a carbon-free future, creating jobs, boosting the economy, and securing the environment. If now is not the time for long-term forward thinking, when ever? My final verdict on the Pickens Plan- green, but not green enough.